Hasta La Ideas

Clerkenwell Design Week 2013: Zaha Hadid has opened a gallery in Clerkenwell, central London, to display her furniture and design to the public (+ slideshow).

The ground floor and lower floor of the Zaha Hadid Design Gallery contains furniture, lighting, jewellery and paintings by the architect.

There’s also a floor of architectural models upstairs, available to view by appointment.

The space was previously home to a pop-up hair salon designed by Hadid during last year’s London Design Festival.

Following the launch during Clerkenwell Design Week, the gallery and showroom is now open to the public from Tuesday to Saturday between midday and 6pm at 101 Goswell Road, London, EC1V 7EZ.

We reported on the highlights from the design fair last week, including lamps that look like vats from a milking parlour and a target made of reflective pixels that change with the light – see all products and events from Clerkenwell Design Week.

Last week two temporary wing-like seating stands were removed from Hadid’s Aquatics Centre at the London 2012 Olympic Park, allowing the building to be seen for the first time as it was originally designed.

Developers recently unveiled images of Hadid’s proposed 60-storey residential skyscraper in Miami, USA – see all architecture by Zaha Hadid.

Photographs are by Luke Hayes.

Here’s some more information about the gallery:

Zaha Hadid Design Gallery

Zaha Hadid Design opens a new Gallery and Showroom featuring innovative product and furniture designs over 2 floors. Also featuring paintings and other artwork by Zaha Hadid.

Zaha Hadid Design creates a wide variety of pieces for living and for the home, from sculptural jewellery to limited edition furniture, experimenting with architectural projects at a small scale, exploring the latest technological and material innovations, as well as responding directly to commercial briefs.

Her portfolio spans a concept for an entire room to bespoke jewellery commissions. The gallery, arranged over two floors, is the first opportunity to view exclusive new designs recently shown in Milan, alongside a showcase of iconic products and original artwork.

Many of the products are available to buy so if you are interested please ask. The space hosts an ever-changing programme of exhibitions and collaborations. We have recently hosted a pop-up hair salon and we regularly showcase emerging fashion and jewellery designers.

As an architect and designer, Zaha Hadid’s designs explore spatial concepts at all scales, from the city to individual product, interior and furniture commissions.

Her projects are internationally renowned and have won the Royal Institute of British Architects Stirling Prize in two consecutive years.

She was awarded the Pritzker Prize in 2004, becoming the first woman to receive architecture’s highest honour, and her Aquatics Centre was the centrepiece of the 2012 Olympic Games in London. She is also engaged in experimental research, leading an architectural practice and teaching.

The post Zaha Hadid Design Gallery
opens to the public appeared first on Dezeen.

by Nicole Rupersburg When you picture an art collector, the image that comes to mind is potentially that of a snooty high-society type fawning over the latest million-dollar piece from whichever artist is currently in vogue, rather than a mustachioed dude who rides…

Continue Reading…

Foster + Partners has completed a new gallery wing clad with golden pipes at the Lenbachhaus art museum in Munich (+ slideshow).

The three-storey extension branches out from the southern facade of the 120-year-old Lenbachhaus, which was first constructed as the home and studio of nineteenth-century painter Franz von Lenbach. It was converted into a museum in the 1920s and had been incrementally extended over the years, so architecture firm Foster + Partners was brought in to rationalise the layout, as well as to add the new gallery wing.

“Our main challenge has been to maintain the same amount of exhibition area within the museum’s footprint, while creating new circulation and visitor spaces,” said architect and studio founder Norman Foster. “Given the way that the different parts of the museum had evolved, there was no such thing as a typical space – every corner is unique and required individual attention and different design decisions.”

Rows of metal pipes made from a copper-aluminium alloy clad each elevation of the extension, designed to complement the restored yellow-ochre render on the walls of the original building. Together, the new and old structures frame the outline of a new courtyard with an entrance at the point where they cross.

Beyond the entrance, visitors are greeted with a triple-height atrium that wraps around the corner of the old exterior walls. A long narrow skylight runs along the edge of the roof and is screened by louvres that cast stripy shadows across the walls, while an installation by Olafur Eliasson is suspended from the centre of the ceiling.

“[An] important aspect of our design has been creating new opportunities for works of art to be exhibited outside the traditional confines of the gallery, such as in the atrium,” added Foster. “This space develops the idea of the ‘urban room’. It is the museum’s public and social heart, and point of connection with the wider city.”

Galleries occupy the two upper floors of the new wing and are dedicated to the display of the Blue Rider collection of expressionist paintings by artists including Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc.

The ground floor contains a temporary exhibition space and an education room, plus a glazed restaurant that opens out to a terrace around the edge of the building.

As part of the renovation, the architects also addressed the energy efficiency of the existing building. They added new heating and cooling systems in the floors, replaced lighting fixtures and introduced a rainwater harvesting system.

Past museum and gallery projects by London firm Foster + Partners include the Sperone Westwater gallery in New York and the Great Court at the British Museum. The team is also currently developing an art museum with four overlapping peaks for Datong, China. See more design by Foster + Partners.

Other museum and gallery buildings we’ve featured with golden cladding include a brass arts centre in Portugal and the Islamic art galleries at the Musée du Louvre in Paris. See more golden buildings on Dezeen.

Photography is by Nigel Young.

Here’s a statement from Foster + Partners:

Lenbachhaus Museum reopens

The Museum’s historic buildings have been carefully restored and the exhibition spaces augmented by a spectacular new wing, which provides an ideal environment for viewing the magnificent ‘Blue Rider’ collection. As well as radically improving the buildings’ environmental performance, the remodelling has created a new entrance and social spaces, including a restaurant, terrace, education facilities and a dramatic full-height atrium, where the old is articulated within the new.

Built in 1891 as a studio and villa for the artist Franz von Lenbach, the Lenbachhaus Museum has been gradually extended over the last century. However, its buildings were in need of renewal and the museum lacked the facilities to cater to a growing audience of 280,000 people a year. Redefining circulation throughout the site, the project has transformed a complex sequence of spaces of different periods into a unified, legible museum that is accessible and open to all.

Peeling away the unnecessary historical accretions, a 1972 extension has been removed to reveal the wall of the original villa, which has been sympathetically restored in ochre render. The different historical elements are then unified along Richard-Wagner Street by a new gallery pavilion, containing two levels of exhibition space. The new building is intended as a ‘jewel box’ for the treasures of the gallery – it is clad in metal tubes of an alloy of copper and aluminium, their colour and form designed to complement the villa’s rich ochre hue and textured facades.

Inside the new building, a sequence of intimate galleries display the Museum’s internationally-renowned ‘Blue Rider’ collection of early twentieth-century Expressionist paintings, echoing the domestic scale of their original setting in the villa Lenbach. As many of the works of art were painted in ‘plein-air’, indirect natural light has been deliberately drawn into the upper level galleries to create the optimum environment for their display.

A new entrance has been created adjacent to the restaurant, accessed via a new landscaped piazza to the east of the museum – this move reclaims the courtyard garden, turning it from a pedestrian thoroughfare into a tranquil space for visitors. The restaurant is open outside of the Museum’s opening hours and its seating continues outside, helping to enliven the surrounding streets and attracting new visitors into the galleries.

The new social heart of the building is a dramatic top-lit atrium, with ticket and information desks, access to a new temporary exhibition space on the ground floor and a grand, cantilevered stair to the upper level galleries. Clearly articulating the old within the new, its impressive volume incorporates the ochre exterior wall of the original villa and is scaled to accommodate large-scale works of art. The Museum commissioned the artist Olafur Eliasson for a site specific work titled Wirbelwerk. During the day sunlight washes the white walls via a long, slender opening at roof level and horizontal louvres cast changing patterns of light and shade within the space.

As well as repairing the fabric of the existing buildings, one of the main aims of the project has been to radically improve the museum’s environmental performance. A water-based heating and cooling system within the floors has been implemented – using significantly less energy than an air based heating, this represents an innovative step in a gallery context. Rainwater is also collected and recycled and lighting has been replaced and upgraded with low-energy systems.

The post Lenbachhaus museum
by Foster + Partners appeared first on Dezeen.

With all eyes on Rio ahead of the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games, Brazilian firm Bernardes + Jacobsen Arquitetura has grouped three disused buildings under an undulating roof to create a new art museum and art school (+ slideshow + photographs by Leonardo Finotti).

The Museu de Arte do Rio, which opened last month, occupies the renovated interiors of the Palacete Dom João, an early-twentieth-century palace beside Mauá Square in Rio’s port. Meanwhile, the Escola do Olhar school is inserted within a former police building and bus station next door.

Inspired by the shape of waves, Bernardes + Jacobsen Arquitetura added an undulating concrete canopy over both of the buildings, sheltering a new outdoor bar and events space on the rooftops.

“We had the challenge of proposing an icon,” architect Bernardo Jacobsen told the Rio Times. “The more modern building had two extra floors so we eliminated these to balance the set. Then we built a wave over the two, almost like a flying object.”

The museum of art comprises eight double-height galleries, accommodated across four near-identical floors. A ground floor entrance leads in through the centre of the facade, where visitors can either head straight towards the exhibitions or take a lift up to the roof.

The neighbouring school is an elevated structure supported by pilotis. The architects have cleaned up the ground floor area to create a public square, while a small sculpture area is positioned alongside.

Three levels of classrooms, workshops and exhibition rooms begin on the first floor, plus a library and auditorium are located on the fourth floor and a bridge links the two buildings on the next level up.

The Museu de Arte do Rio opened to the public with four eclectic exhibitions of Brazilian and international art.

Above: site plan – click for larger image

The renovated palace won’t be the only museum completed ahead of the 2016 Olympic games. The Museum of Image and Sound Rio by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Casa Daros, a museum of Latin American art, by Paulo Mendes da Rocha are also set to open in the next three years. See more architecture in Brazil on Dezeen.

Above: ground floor plan – click for larger image

See more photography by Leonardo Finotti on Dezeen or on the photographer’s website.

Above: mezzanine level – click for larger image

Read on for more project details from Jacobsen Arquitetura:

MAR – Art Museum of Rio

Our challenge was to unite three existing buildings with different architectural characteristics to house the Museu de Arte do Rio, the school “A Escola do Olhar” as well as cultural and leisure spaces. The existing buildings, the palace “Palacete Dom João”, the police building and the old central bus station of Rio, connected shall be part of the major urban redevelopment in the historic downtown of Rio de Janeiro. For each construction we analysed different levels of preservation.

Above: first floor plan – click for larger image

The first step was to establish a flow system allowing the Museum and school to work in an integrated and efficient manner. Therefore we proposed the creation of a suspended square on the police building rooftop, which will unite all accesses and host a bar and an area for cultural events and leisure. Consequently, the visitation will be from top to bottom.

Above: second floor plan – click for larger image

It was established that the palace, due to its large ceiling height and structure free plan should hold the exhibition areas of the museum. The police building shall be used for the school, auditoriums, multimedia exhibition areas, administration areas and employee areas of the complex.

Above: third floor plan – click for larger image

The stilts, currently used as an access to the road, will turn into a large foyer for entire complex, and will hold the sculpture exhibition areas. Access will be controlled between the two buildings, characterizing this empty space as internal, open and covered. The marquee of the Road, heritage element listed by the City, will be used for lavatories, store and region of loading, unloading and deposits.

Above: fourth floor plan – click for larger image

The connection and circulation of visitors between the two buildings, in the form of a suspended catwalk will belong to this new building, featuring the most unusual state possible.

Above: fifth floor plan – click for larger image

For the police building, we propose the suspension of the last floor to balance the height of the two buildings as well as the replacement of the masonry closing façade profiles using translucent glass, making the structural system of indented columns visible and revealing the stilts.

Above: sixth floor plan – click for larger image

Finally as the main mark of the project, we suggested that the suspended square have an abstract and aerial form. A fluid and extremely light structure, simulating water surface waves. A poetic architectural character full of meaning, simple and at the same time modern in regards to the structural calculation. This element shall be seen near and by far, and from below to who is arriving at the Praça Mauá, from above by those who are at the Morro da Conceição.

Above: cross-section – click for larger image

Above: elevation – click for larger image

The post Museu de Arte do Rio by
Bernardes + Jacobsen Arquitetura appeared first on Dezeen.

The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is set to reopen next week following a ten-year restoration and extension programme led by Spanish office Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos (+ slideshow).

Above: the Atrium, photographed by Pedro Pegenaute

Working alongside French architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte and restoration architect Van Hoogevest, Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos has overhauled the interior of the historic arts and crafts museum, which was designed by architect Pierre Cuypers in the late nineteenth century. As well as restoring galleries to their original configuration, the architects have created a new entrance hall and added a pavilion to showcase Asian artworks.

Above: the Atrium, photographed by Pedro Pegenaute

The entrance hall, named the Atrium, replaces a series of gallery extensions in the museum’s two inner courtyards.

Above: the Atrium, photographed by Pedro Pegenaute

A rib-vaulted passageway divided the space in two, so the architects have lowered the floor to create an underground zone linking the two sides from underneath. As the main route through the building, this passageway was then reconnected to the hall with a set of new staircases.

Above: the passageway, photographed by Pedro Pegenaute

The architects have installed a new glass roof to enclose the grand triple-height court, filled with natural light. Polished Portuguese stone covers the floor, while two rectangular chandelier-like structures are suspended overhead on each side.

Above: Gallery of Honour, photographed by Iwan Baan

Elsewhere in the museum, lowered ceilings and half-storeys have been removed to rationalise the layout of the Rijksmuseum‘s 80 galleries, which have been completely reorganised. Only Rembrandt’s seventeenth-century painting The Night Watch remains in its original position, in the dedicated Night Watch Gallery.

Above: Rijksmuseum, photographed by Iwan Baan

New display areas are designed by Jean-Michel Wilmotte to look invisible where possible and include cases made from anti-reflective glass and simple rectangular plinths. Walls are finished in five different shades of grey, in line with Cuypers’ original palette.

Above: The Night Watch Gallery, photographed by Iwan Baan

Under the supervision of Van Hoogevest, the terrazzo floor has been restored in the Great Hall, while additional ornaments have been revitalised in the Gallery of Honour and within the stairwells.

Above: 17th Century Gallery, photographed by Iwan Baan

The new Asian Pavilion is located to the south of the building and features walls of stone and glass. It is surrounded by water and sits within redesigned gardens by Dutch landscape architects Copijn Landschapsarchitecten.

Above: 17th Century Gallery, photographed by Iwan Baan

A number of historic museums have been given a facelift in recent years. Also in Amsterdam, Benthem Crouwel Architects recently added a sink-like extension to the Stedelijk Museum, while David Chipperfield won the Mies van der Rohe Award for his 2009 renovation of the Neues Museum in Berlin. See more museums on Dezeen.

Above: 20th Century Gallery, photographed by Iwan Baan

Here’s some more information about the opening:

Rijksmuseum to open following ten-year transformation

The Rijksmuseum will open on 13 April 2013, following a ten-year transformation. Never before has a national museum undergone such a complete transformation of both its building and the presentation of its collection.

Spanish architecture firm Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos has spectacularly transformed the 19th-century building into a museum for the 21st century, with a bright and spacious entrance, a new Asian Pavilion and beautifully restored galleries. Under the guidance of restoration architect Van Hoogevest, the lavish decoration scheme of Pierre Cuypers, the original architect of the museum, has been fully reconstructed in a number of the museum’s key spaces. Parisian architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte designed the new interior of the galleries, fusing 19th-century grandeur with modern design.

The presentation of the Rijksmuseum’s world-famous collection is also new. For the very first time, visitors can follow a chronological journey through the collection, and experience the sense of beauty and time this offers. In a sequence of 80 galleries, 8,000 objects tell the story of 800 years of Dutch art and history. Only Rembrandt’s masterpiece The Night Watch will be returning to its original position.

The renovation and opening of the Rijksmuseum is made possible by founder Philips and main sponsors BankGiro Lottery, ING and KPN. The restoration of the Cuypers colours is made possible by AKZONobel/Sikkens.

Above: 18th Century Gallery, photographed by Iwan Baan

Journey through time, from the Middle Ages to Mondrian

The new presentation of the Rijksmuseum collection is a journey through Dutch art and history from the Middle Ages and Renaissance until the 20th century. The story of the Netherlands has been set in an international context and is told chronologically across four separate floors. Paintings, prints, drawings, photographs, silver, porcelain, delftware, furniture, jewellery, arms, fashion and objects from Dutch history will be presented together for the very first time.

More than 30 galleries are dedicated to the glory of the Golden Age, when the young mercantile republic led the world in trade, science, military exploits and the arts. At the heart of the museum will be the magnificently restored Gallery of Honour, presenting world-famous masterpieces by Vermeer, Rembrandt, Frans Hals and Jan Steen. The Gallery of Honour leads visitors to the dedicated space that architect Cuypers created for Rembrandt’s The Night Watch in the late 19th century, and where this huge masterpiece can once again be admired.

New to the presentation are the 20th century galleries. Paintings, furniture, photography, film and an aeroplane paint a picture of Dutch culture from the last century.

Above: 18th Century Gallery, photographed by Iwan Baan

Special Collections

The Special Collections are also displayed separately for the first time. Here, visitors will be able to discover famous and unexpected objects from the applied arts, science and national history, such as ship and navy models, musical instruments, and an armoury.

Above: Cuypers Library, photographed by Iwan Baan

New acquisitions and restorations

With the support of businesses, funds and private donors, hundreds of new objects and works of art have been acquired over the last ten years, of which more than 100 will be showcased in the museum when it reopens. The Rijksmuseum was also able to carefully study and restore almost the entire collection of works featured in the new presentation. Highlights among the new acquisitions include:

The ‘Golden Bend’ in the Herengracht (1671-72) by Gerrit Berckheyde, one of the highlights of the Dutch landscape genre from the Golden Age. Acquired with the support of Royal Dutch Shell, the National Art Collections Fund foundation and the BankGiro Lottery.

The Burgomaster of Delft and his Daughter (1655) by Jan Steen, one of the masterpieces of the 17th century collection. Acquired with the support of the BankGiro Lottery, The Mondrian Fund, VSB, Vereniging Rembrandt and National Art Collections Fund foundation.

A rare white armchair (1923) by Dutch designer and architect Gerrit Rietveld. With the support of the BankGiro Lottery Fund.

Two-metre high wooden sculptures of celestial warriors from Japan, temple guardians from the 14th century. With the support of the BankGiro Lottery Fund, the M.J. Drabbe Fund, The Mondrian Foundation and Vereniging Rembrandt.

Above: Great Hall, photographed by Jannes Linders

Cuypers for the 21st century

The main building of the Rijksmuseum has undergone a spectacular transformation. The lead architect for the renovation was Seville-based architecture firm Cruz y Ortiz. They based their ideas on the original design by Pierre Cuypers, the 19th-century architect of the museum. Under the motto Cuypers for the 21st century, and in close collaboration with Dutch restoration architect Van Hoogevest, the architects have turned the 19th-century national monument into a modern museum for the 21st century, restoring and introducing light and space. Cruz y Ortiz have opened up the previously converted inner courtyards into an impressive glass-covered new entrance hall, known as the Atrium. The original, richly decorated walls and ceilings have been revealed again in a number of places under the guidance of architect Van Hoogevest. The French architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte, known for his work in the Louvre, is responsible for the design of the Rijksmuseum galleries. He has designed elegant display cases, plinths, lighting and furniture, and has selected an interior colour scheme inspired by Pierre Cuypers’ palette for the building.

Above: Gallery of Honour, photographed by Iwan Baan

The new Asian Pavilion

Surrounded by water, the new Asian Pavilion is made from Portuguese stone and glass, and is characterised by many oblique surfaces and unusual sightlines. It houses the museum’s rich collection of Asian art from China, Japan, Indonesia, India, Vietnam and Thailand, dating from 2000 B.C. to 2000 A.D. A total of approximately 350 objects will be on display.

New “outdoor museum”

Based on Cuypers’ 1901 design, the Rijksmuseum gardens’ new layout was created by Dutch garden and landscape architecture firm Copijn. The gardens feature several of the original formal garden styles, as well as classical statues, and fragments and ornaments of historic buildings. A fountain, a water artwork designed by Jeppe Hein, a 19th-century greenhouse with ‘forgotten’ vegetables, and a children’s garden with playground equipment by Dutch designer Aldo van Eyck will soon be added to this “outdoor museum”. A Henry Moore exhibition will open in the new gardens on 21 June 2013, the first in a series of international sculpture exhibitions to be held each year.

The post Rijksmuseum by Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos
and Jean-Michel Wilmotte appeared first on Dezeen.