Museums and Libraries: The Latest Architecture and News

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Construction of Santiago Calatrava’s Museu do Amanhã (Museum of Tomorrow) in Rio de Janeiro is underway and on-track to be completed in the second half of 2015. Located on the Pier Mauá, the museum will encompass a 15,000m2 built area and include gardens, leisure areas, bike paths, and a reflective pool, totaling over 30,000m2. The ground floor of the museum will include a store, auditorium, temporary exhibit rooms, a restaurant, administrative offices and space for research and educational activities. The upper floor, connected to the ground floor with ramps, will include long-term exhibits, a café and a panoramic lookout.

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British architect David Adjaye is set to submit plans for new Studio Museum in Harlem. Designed to replace the 47-year-old museum's existing facility on Manhattan's West 125th Street, the new $122 million proposal will more than double the museum's space, allowing it to become a premier center for contemporary artists of African descent.

According to the New York Times, Adjaye was chosen to design the museum due to his sensitivity regarding the artists and surrounding neighborhood, which in turn inspired the project; the project's main space will feature a four-story, multi-use core marked by an "inverted stoop" that will act as an inviting "living room" and host for public programs.

“I wanted to honor this idea of public rooms, which are soaring, celebratory and edifying — uplifting,” he told the New York Times. “Between the residential and the civic, we learned the lessons of public realms and tried to bring those two together.”

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The acclaimed Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester, northern England, has been named by the Art Fund as the 2015 Museum of the Year. The project has been hailed by the jury as "one of the great museum achievements of recent years," citing its "transformation – architecturally, curatorially, and as a destination" – as a key reason for its success. The building, which has been received well by critics, was comprehensively restored and extended by MUMA (McInnes Usher McKnight) and re-opened to the public earlier this year. Since then it has seen record-breaking visitor numbers, partly due to the appeal of the building and partly due to "the creativity and originality of its outreach programmes during closure."

Architectural photographer Pedro Pegenaute has shared with us a video through MX-SI's Serlachius Museum Gösta in Mänttä, Finland. An expansion of the existing Joennimei manor, the new building was built to host contemporary art traveling exhibitions and accommodate the museum's growing collections. MX-SI was also commissioned to design a new bridge that connects the museum to the island of Taavetinsaari. You can see them both in the film above.

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A competition entry by the architects von Gerkan, Marg and Partners (gmp) has been awarded first prize for the new Guangzhou City Museum. The commission was announced at the same time as Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos' selection for the Guangzhou Science Museum, both of which will join the city's new Art Museum by Thomas Herzog Architects to form the central cultural precinct of Guangzhou - China's third largest city.

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Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos has been selected over MAD Architects, Steven Holl, Grimshaw and many others to design the Guangzhou Science Museum.

Planned for the sprawling port city of Guangzhou (Canton), the new science museum will be realized on the south bank of the Pearl River, close to the Guangzhou Tower. It will form part of a new cultural hub, known as "Three Museums - One Square," which will include the future Guangzhou Museum, also won through a private-competition by gmp Architects von Gerkan, Marg and Partners.

Read on for a video and more information detailing the winning proposal.

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Norman Foster, Jean Nouvel and Rem Koolhaas are competing to design the new Western Australian Museum (WA Museum) in the Perth Cultural Center. As The West Australian reports, the leading architects are part of three shortlisted consortiums being considered to develop the new $428 million project. Each team is currently working with the government on their proposals. A team is expected to be announced later this year. The museum is slated to open in 2020.

The complete list of the shortlisted teams include...

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