National Estonian Museum

National Estonian Museum, Tartu (EST)


LOCATION:
Tartu (EST)

ARCHITECT:
DGT Architects

MODEL:
Perseo

MORE INFO:
www.erm.ee/en (customer)
www.dgtarchitects.com (architects)

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GRAND PRIX AFEX 2016. AFEX stands for “French Architects Abroad” and it is an agency promoting French Architects’ know-how abroad. The prize is given every 2 years by AFEX in partnership with the French Ministry of Culture, the French Ministry of Foreign affairs and the “Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine”.

DGT Architects is an international partnership founded in 2006 in Paris and practicing Architecture, Urbanism and Space Design. It is lead by three architects: Dan Dorell, Lina Ghotmeh and Tsuyoshi Tane ; the partnership gained an international reputation through its design of the Estonian National Museum.

When the founders of DGT Architects, won the competition to design the Estonian National Museum in Tartu the practice had not even officially formed. However, it has been busy since – entering numerous competitions and creating everything from stage sets to installations – but the completion of the Estonian National Museum this year undoubtedly serves as a dramatic statement of intent.

A site that was once shrouded in secrecy is now home to a museum and the artefacts that divulge the history of a country and its people. Estonia, a country of 1.3 million, whose two periods of independence – between the wars and since 1991 – add up to less than 50 years, and which still has grounds to be nervous of its neighbour Russia, has reason to define and assert itself with a museum, but it also has to tread cautiously. The idea of a national museum has been linked to the idea of Estonian independence for more than a century, ever since a group of nationalist-minded intellectuals decided to create such a thing. Since then the fluctuating fortunes of independence, war and occupation have caused the collections to be housed in different places, to be dispersed and reassembled. Under postwar Soviet occupation the contents and concept of the museum were threatened. In the late 80s the call to reinstate the museum was part of a new campaign for freedom. The new €70m building is the fulfilment of this desire, after many years of debate and interruptions since Estonia won back independence in 1991.

It is not in the capital Tallinn but 190km away in the second city, Tartu (population 100,000), and not precisely there either but a 2km journey through sometimes brutal weather from the centre. But what the site lacks in accessibility it makes up for in significance: it includes the remains of a manor house, wrecked in 1944, in which the collections were housed between the wars. It also includes an airstrip, with associated earthworks for protecting warplanes, used by the Soviet military. With the aircraft roaring over the ancient university town of Tartu, it was a symbol of the hatefulness of occupation.

DGT’s proposal for this Museum challenged the competition brief. Instead of locating the building on the proposed site, DGT chose to re-appropriate a nearby former Soviet military base as the setting for the Museum – a physically present ‘ruin’ of a painful history. They believed that the new Museum should play an essential role in the regeneration of the area and to do so it had to start by dealing with this heavily charged and spatially unique place. With a sensitive implementation on this site, the National Museum becomes a continuation of the airfield – its roof lifting and expanding towards ‘infinite space’ – inviting the visitor to enter into the landscape and into the heart of the museum.

The structure resembles a glass vast groundscraper inserted into the landscape that slowly reaches upward from the ground – a built allegory for the country’s emerging history,” the architects said. The facades are covered in a printed motif of an abstracted cornflower, Estonia’s national flower, giving the glazing a frosted appearance.

The outer skin of the building was designed as translucent layers that maintain constant connection with the surrounding landscape. The glass facade protects from the rain, snow and extreme weather conditions. This is achieved with three layers of glass that regulate the temperature and allows the direct sunlight inside through the building’s south facade where the exhibition halls and the sheltered spaces are located. The curtain wall acts as a rain cover that conforms to the facade giving a sculptural feature to the traditional Estonian patterns and at the same time integrating the landscape environment as a constant in the territory and context.

The customer opted for our PERSEO model thanks to its pure and straight lines that matched with the look of the venue; the chair is totally upholstered in a dark fabric whose thread combines two different shades of grey and black to create an impressive volume effect.

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