Matt - Site

Sam - Sorry for the lack of response, I would have loved to go to Berlin and see the various galleries, as well as the museum of Architectural drawings; I had looked into getting a train from Munich, but unfortunately couldn’t afford to do it.

I have of course now chosen a site, which is the ‘island’ site near the parliament building, and am still looking to do a Museum of Energy.

The link below has various photos of the site, surrounding area and some information of the site.

One of my main reasons for choosing the site was, to make use of the river for references of hydro power, as Munich is very landlocked, with the only sea access in Northern Germany.  So coincidently when exploring the site I discovered that there is an existing hydro power plant located under the river, west of the site, which would perfectly tie the site in with the program.  Some images are located in the link above.

The site, although in a beautiful location, is rather unused compared to some other areas locally.  One of the main things I noticed was the sheer quantity of people sunbathing, and such, on any patch of land near the river, yet the site itself was underused by comparison.  Therefore in my opinion the by developing a building on this site wouldn’t be too detrimental, provided that the landscaping of the site is carefully considered, and improve the overall feel of the site.

I was also hoping to possibly link the new museum German Museum, a proposal of a sort of sister museum.  When exploring the museum I found that there was a small exhibition with some information about renewable technologies and some mention of nuclear power.  However my feeling on the exhibition was that it was too busy, with a lot of information to take in, in such a small environment.  The spaces I would like to create are to be more spacious areas, allowing for ‘room to think’, experiencing scale accurately, and showcasing the various technologies.

I also visited a lot of other galleries and museums, such as the Brandhorst Museum, Norman Foster’s new Lenbachhaus extension, The BMW Welt and Museum, as well as other galleries around Munich.

I shall post some more information regarding my program details and ambitions, and shortly start to look into some more precedents.