Architect and Builder Dec 2017 / Jan 2018 | Page 43

Design Concept – Zeitz MOCAA
The main challenge for the team was to convert
the tightly packed concrete tubes into spaces
suitable for displaying art whilst retaining the
building’s industrial heritage. The question was
asked: How to lure people into the building, which,
unlike most landmark buildings, wasn’t going to be
about creating an iconic exterior?
Described as part deconstruction, part
construction and part archaeology - rather than
resorting to wholesale demolition and without
completely destroying the authenticity of the
original building, Heatherwick Studio developed
a concept to make the building compelling from
Zeitz Mocaa
the inside by carving out an atrium, like a vaulted
cathedral, to form the museum’s heart. Hewn from
the building’s centre, it provides access to the 80
gallery floors that are organised around the central
atrium and forms a major social space that reveals
the original intersecting structural geometries in
an unexpected way. The gallery spaces are white
boxes that have been carefully placed within the
retained concrete façade. The galleries span six
floors and are accessed via lifts and the metal spiral
staircase that was crane lifted into the tubes.
Realising the concept of carved tubes was
technically challenging. Taking inspiration from
the billions of kernels of corn that historically filled
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