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Following last Thursday’s feedback, I’ve been mulling over my Tapestry Museum. I have a proposal that does away with the interim design, not least because I felt that the idea of the textured sculptural façade was too superficial an interpretation of ‘Tapestry’. This new proposal is borne out of 3 questions that have been driving my thinking:
1. How do you harness the potential of Tapestry’s ‘server room’? How do you celebrate this technical feature? Does the museum announce itself or the servers’ importance to the city like a billboard? (like the Cathedral before it?)
2. Do you build above or below ground? Where do you place front of house/back of house? (FOH/BOH) Where are the public/private spaces?
3. How do you design a building that is tailored to your program, yet affords flexibility and opportunity for future reconfiguration?
Soooo, as I was rearranging the ‘hero’ spaces of the function hall and exhibition areas (served), FOH and BOH spaces (servant), I considered the typology of a theatre – specifically the idea of a ‘fly system’. For those playing at home, a fly system is essentially a rigging system of pulleys and counterweights that enables stage crew to hoist scenery above the open space of the stage.
Then I thought what if I flipped the notion of front of house and back of house into above house and below house? I envision the ground floor of Tapestry to be sandwiched between a rigging system (above) that contains the museum, café and technical services ‘pods’ and an underground floor (below) that contains amenities and rows of seating. When Tapestry is in ‘museum’ mode, the pods are mechanically lowered down and the pod walls (covered in digital screens) could be opened up to create a variety of configurations for the Tapestry installation. When Tapestry is in ‘forum’ mode, the museum pods remain suspended above ground floor and rows of seats (either as modules or as individual chairs) are brought up to create an auditorium.
The ground floor is surrounded by glazed window/doors which are fully retractable where possible, allowing the space to be opened up for use as a market hall or performance space. My idea here is that apart from the Tapestry program, this flexible space remains permeable and amenable to a variety of functions.
The first floor rigging system of Tapestry would be covered in swathes of perforated metal sheeting based on the many geometric patterns in the Cathedral. There could also be areas on the mesh onto which user-submitted data could be projected. My goal here is to relate Tapestry’s ornament to the Cathedral whilst affording a glimpse beyond its translucent façade into the rigging system of interlocking pods, servers, pulleys and counterweights.
I realise the massing is still rough, but I’m excited by this idea because I think it celebrates the technology of the museum, yet allows for flexibility/adaptability in its layout. The idea of above/below house innovates the traditional BOH/FOH typology, allowing the main space of the design to remain physically/visually connected to Chapter House Lane and Flinders Street. The design stems directly from programmatic considerations. It is also consistent with my group vision’s notion of extending the presence of Flinders Street into the close - which I translated into the permeable/flexible ground floor space.
Valid precedents are REX’s Wyly Theatre, which has a similar idea of above/below house but on a MUCH larger scale, and Atelier Bow-Wow’s BMW Guggenheim Lab, which houses an open programmable space beneath a translucent superstructure.
I do realise, however, that I may be opening up a can of worms. Questions that are already popping up:
1. How the hell do you design the structural system? Apart from the system of pulleys and counterweights, how do you span such a space with minimal vertical supports? Huge trusses?
2. 1. How does the building relate to the undercroft? (this is a question which continually boggles me)
3. 2. And I’m sure there are more…
So do you think there is merit in this idea and I should pursue it or at least appropriate it? Or should I scrap this potentially complex idea in favour of my interim design and work on revising that instead? I was eager to share this alternative proposal with you fairly early on in this period before investing too much time in it for fear of it being rejected next week. Having typed this out, I already know there are inherent biases/judgements in this post! All feedback / comments welcomed.
REX’s Wyly Theatre
Atelier Bow-wow’s BMW Guggenheim Lab