Museums and Libraries: The Latest Architecture and News

In celebration of the 100th Bauhaus anniversary, the Foundation Bauhaus Dessau has announced plans to construct a new Bauhaus Museum in Dessau. As part of a competition “preannouncement” published on the museum’s site, an open two-phased international competition will challenge architects to design a museum for the foundation’s “outstanding collection” under the “best possible conservation conditions.”

Co-promoter of the competition, the City of Dessau-Roßlau is currently searching for possible sites that will allow the Bauhaus Museum Dessau to be integrated into the city's central City Park. It is hoped that the museum and park will “strengthen and complement each other and enrich the location as a cultural centre.”

A breakdown of key competition dates, after the break. 

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A contemporary museum set within the oldest settlement in the Louisiana Purchase, Trahan Architects’ Louisiana State Sports Hall of Fame and Regional History Museum is distinguished for its sculpted interior and contrasting copper facade. Watch the short film above as Spirit of Space tours through the building, capturing the museum’s historic context and central pathway.

SO-IL, in collaboration with FREAKS freearchitects, has been selected as the first-prize winner of a competition to reinvent the historic Site Verrier in France. Located in the Northern Vosges Natural Park, the updated plan addresses three elements of the site's industrial past while providing a dynamic space for cultural interaction and historic exploration of Site Verrier's glass factory days.

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This sculptural memorial by SO/AP Architectes, located at the center of what was the Warsaw Ghetto, commemorates the history and memories of the Polish nation by uniting its oppressive and heroic pasts in one form. Simultaneously representing the Jewish and non-Jewish population, the serpentine structure symbolizes the entirety of the Polish people to strengthen their identity as one collective community.

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The Bengal Foundation has begun work on its Contemporary Arts and Crafts Museum, Bangladesh's first private museum of its kind. The ambitious complex will house multi-media works from the organization's founder Abul Khair's private collection, pieces by local artists, a sculpture garden, and a boat museum to celebrate the various cultural arts of local residents.

Learn more about the museum's design, after the break.

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RTA-Office has released its first-prize winning proposal for the Wuhu Urban Planning Exhibition, Office, and Archive. The design stems from the idea of an “urban cultural container,” holding both knowledge and space, and extracts its sculptural form from the surrounding mountainous landscape.

Pushing for the Exhibition Hall to be a recognizable landmark, the design is largely driven by its surrounding context. The building as a whole derives its shape from the rocky faces of the nearby Yashan Mountain, giving it a strong sense of place. Similarly, the structure is divided into three distinct sections all grounded by a central public space, each informed by the same rocky inspiration. The cracks in the rocks’ surfaces are mirrored in the irregular entrances and windows carved into the building’s volumes.

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Herzog & de Meuron have unveiled the design for their Slow Food Pavilion, due for completion by the 2015 Milan Expo in May. Showcasing the work of Carlo Petrini's Slow Food organization, the pavilion promotes the global organization's vision of universal access to "good, clean and fair food."

Sited on a triangular piece of land in the Eastern end of the Expo's central boulevard, the pavilion uses a a triangular configuration of tables to evoke what Herzog & de Meuron describe as "an atmosphere of refectory and market."

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Although the Young Architects Program (YAP) announced Andrés Jaque of Office of Political Innovation as winner of its 2015 MoMA PS1 competition last week, the competition was fierce. Phenomena by Studio Benjamin Dillenburger addressed the idea of phenomenology in design, creating an experiential space that stimulates all the senses and hosts multiple programs.

Phenomena was one of the five shortlisted proposals for this year's MoMA PS1 YAP competition. Read more about the proposal after the break.

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Auerbach Halevy Architects have been announced as winner of a competition to design a museum to display the history and future of Jewish sports in the heart of the Maccabiah Village – a 22 acre sports complex at the outskirts of Ramat Gan, Israel. With over 700,000 business travelers and tourists entering its gates each year, the complex plans to join the museum with a 350-seat auditorium, three-star hotel and education spaces to maximize its appeal and use. The building will also include the Maccabi House archives - the world's largest repository and collection of documents and objects related to the living heritage of Jewish sports.

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The first prize winner of a Greek design competition in Greece, which challenged participants to redesign an existing structure into an archaeological museum, this proposal by Tsabikos Petras Architectural Studio examines both the reintroduction of green areas into the city and relationship among city, sea, and coast. The scheme follows the lead of a north-south and east-west axis which present a pedestrian connection between the museum and a public square, and an archaeological site with a second public square, respectively.

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