MERCEDES-BENZ MUSEUM UN STUDIO
RYAN SCHWARTZ
INDEX
FORM ........................... ......................................................... ................................................. ................... 2 BODY ..............................................................................8 TECHNIQUE ............................ ........................................................... ....................................11 .....11 SPACE ..........................................................................14
FORM
In the heart of Stuttgart, Germany stands a beacon of exemplary automotive engineering, proudly housed in an equally impressive museum. museum. The Mercedes-Benz Museum by UN Studio is unique in that it showcases a static collection of specific vehicles - rather than an accumulation of various works of art, pieces of cultural or historical significance, scientific curiosities or other exhibits typical of museums. The building itself embodies and reflects many characteristics of the legendary automobiles that it holds, and becomes itself a monument to fluidity and mobility.
Form in Motion
This simple design pattern evolved from line, to surface, to a final complex volume. Major axes and dimensions were fixed early, and all subsequent geometry was parametrically constructed.
This flowing design was inspired by the trefoil, which consists of three loops loops continuously returning returning into themselves. The celebrated Mercedes-Benz symbol bears a strong resemblance to the original design inspiration, though UN Studio accounts this to pure coincidence. This was undoubtedly not a mistake however, as the design design competition aimed to create a building iconic of the luxury car brand – a fact that UN Studio took full advantage of.
Architects Ben van Berkel and Caroline Bos attempted to create a ‘twist’ on the museum typology by harnessing the incredibly specific programmatic individuality of this building. As a museum centred on automobility, they focused much of their attention on the ambulatory circulation system within the building which began to dictate the overall form.
Museums of late pushed their respective boundaries in regards to form, but this project became an sum of the best features used in the past. Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim Museum in New York was pioneering in its use of a prescribed spiral circulation system. UN Studio inverted and doubled this system into intertwining helices with two main narrative scripts.
The Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin by Mies van der Rohe provided unobstructed routes, allowing patrons to choose their own paths. The double helices in this case were meshed in such a way as to allow various combinations of specified routes, adapting the form to keep this function.
UN STUDIO 1988
Vehicle Sales
Varying Trajectories Mercedes-Benz 1926 Benz
Daimler
1886
1901
UN Studio Projects
2012
1886 WWI
WWII
The union of UN Studio with Mercedes-Benz was well timed, given the climaxing success of both companies. 1959
1968
1977
2006
In a similar fashion to the Centre Pompidou in Paris, this circulatory space becomes becomes celebrated. Unlike Paris which segregates these circulation spaces from the gallery however, the two become so enmeshed that it becomes difficult to distinguish one from the other.
Combining these factors with the reversal of ambulation through the space (where patrons enter the building, immediately ride an elevator to the top floor, and begin their descent) descent) a distinct typological form was created, applauded, and subsequently copied by others shortly thereafter. Throughout the nine levels of exhibits there are no closed rooms and no straight walls. This encourages the smooth, flowing continuity of overlapping exhibits which are based on along a narrative timeline (thereby having no abrupt starts and stops) - all coexisting simultaneously along a blurred continuum.
Ambulation
n a l P
Start
The unending loops of a trefoil translate directly into the spatial arrangement of displays within the museum.
c i r t e m o n o x A
Finish
Narrated Choice
n o i t a r o l p x E f o s r u o H 6 4 n i y r o t s i H f o s r a e Y 0 0 1 r e v O
The enmeshed double helices used as both display and circulatory space allow for a directional narrative, but also allow patrons to have choice in their route of exploration.
Narrowing Focus EXHIBIT
This continuity was masterfully accentuated by the deliberate removal of focal points that distract the viewers’ eye away from the exhibits. These include angular corners where walls meet the floor, ceiling, other walls, or the intense use of colour.
EXHIBIT
Through folding, curving, and the removal of colour, the architects were able to allow the cars on display to consume the entire focus and attention of the viewer, while the visual distractions of the formal structure begin to fade quietly into the background.
Mirrored Projection Though never explicitly stated by UN Studio architects, the materiality and aesthetics of the museum bear striking resemblance to the formal qualities of the modern automobile, especially those of MercedesBenz. The projection of car onto building allows the two to mirror one another, strengthening their symbolic relationship.
Iconic . 360 Ribbons of Glass
Subtle Curves
Hard Lines
Colour Scheme
Grill Elements
Glowing Lights
BODY
Plane & Pace
Periodic Choice
Elevation
Pace
Many Cars, Many Angles
The lack of intense colour and visual way-finding landmarks in combination with a melding of levels and continual rotation easily plays tricks visitors. visitors. Sense of direction and and elevation are soon thwarted by means of the rhythmic circulatory paths.
UN Studio used the ramping helices as a subtle form of influence on the body. The dynamic dynamic between horizontal and gently descending floor planes acts as a subconscious clue to visitors exploring the museum. The oblique floor planes were meant to stimulate the mobility of people walking and are used as transition areas between exhibits, whereas exhibits are housed on more static traditional surfaces, causing visitors to slow their pace. This is further augmented by strategic use of the curving and folding walls and the periodic choice of route that must be made.
In a sense, this allows the user to focus more intensely on the exhibits, while also allowing people to view the various cars from a variety of angles and heights as they pass by (not only horizontally but vertically), making the cars seem less static..
Conditioned Sensory Experience As a building dedicated to a vehicular time-line, one can begin to appreciate the subtle approach taken to ensure its adherence to this peculiar program. As previously examined, museum typologies often consist of a singular open plan where users can bounce in seemingly random fashion from exhibit to exhibit, or a highly structured narrative of discrete elements to be viewed only one at a time.
Role Reversal The car is a machine dedicated to motion. Similarly, the Mercedes-Benz Museum is a machine dedicated to motion. It was designed specifically to move hundreds hundreds of thousands thousands of people each year around its exhibits - cars on display that were built to move, but are forced to sit still in their new environment. environment. It is the museum itself that seems to to shift instead, smearing smearing its internal boundaries and blending its formal elements. This sense of blurred distortion holds strong ties to the modern car, especially the renowned speed of Mercedes-Benz engineering. In this case however, instead of cars speeding past, the building races all around you as do hundreds of other visitors, while the cars themselves sit in perfect clarity.
These approaches, although appropriate in some instances, were not suitable for this program. UN Studio was able to cleverly condition the interaction and experience provided by the museum to the visitors, in a fashion that mimics the rhythmic ebb and flow of time. Overlapping booms and busts are provided in a cyclical experience – as one exhibit beings to fade from view, another is beginning to loom just ahead.
TECHNIQUE
The creation of copies inherently reduces the value of the original, thereby elevating the cost or perceived value of singular works of art, rare cars, first edition books, etc. By creating a unique and nonnonreproducible building, the significance of the building is elevated. elevated. Visitors who wish to experience the museum and its exhibits must travel to the museum itself as that particular experience cannot be found anywhere else in the world. world. Similar buildings may may exist, yet none that begin to resemble a copy of the original. This is in part due to the use of computer aided design by UN Studio in the museum’s creation. Though curvilinear forms have been seen in architecture for centuries, the complex mathematical geometries existing in multiple dimensions as seen in the Mercedes-Benz Museum require computer design aid for both modelling and engineering purposes. Computer aided design (CAD) has revolutionized building technology and modes of construction. The use of computers in the modelling and drawing of this building allowed for complete freedom in form. The multitude of continuous curves, slopes and oblique lines of the building resulted in a structure that was incredibly complex to build. Each concrete form was custom made and there were thousands of pieces of angled glass for the windows that needed to fit exactly in place. Without the use of computers, computers, this building would have been nearly impossible to build. Without the original schematic plans, the building literally could be not be reproduced.
Reproducibility
E U L A V
COPIES
Somewhat ironically however, the automobile (even with its complex geometry) was has been specifically designed for mass production. As the two begin to slowly converge, perhaps this will have the same effect on buildings of the future. The advent of CAD has has also allowed for the easy easy reproduction and distribution of construction drawings, allowing indefinite reproductions and copies to be made quite readily, thereby devaluing iconic architecture.
Complexity via CAD
Technical Safety The complex geometrical form of the museum lends itself not only to an effective exhibit layout and experience, but also some highly advanced advanced public safety features. features. As modern buildings, especially those open to the public, are subjected to more rigorous safety codes, these standards become increasingly informative to the building’s composition. This is especially true in the case of fires – a long standing nemesis of the built environment. The central atrium which connects to each floor via open air circulation allows for a complex ventilation system to remove smoke in the case of fire. Aside from common sprinkler systems, this building has the ability to generate a strong wind current within the atrium by means of several large fans in the roof which form a vortex of swirling air. This miniature tornado sucks the toxic air from all circulation and exhibit spaces into the uninhabited space of the atrium, while simultaneously allowing fresh air to permeate into the public spaces through the opening of multiple vents. Visitors are then able to see and make their way out safely out of the building. This autonomous autonomous behaviour nearly resembles organismal self-preservation characteristics, detecting problems and mitigating them.
The creation of an iconic building for the sole purpose of displaying objects immediately increases the perceived value of the objects being displayed, as if they were on a pedestal. pedestal. This transformation of the objects aligns aligns with Mercedes-Benz’s Mercedes-Benz’s company objectives, those those of high value luxury cars. By constructing a pedestal pedestal on the scale of a multistory museum to display its own goods, Mercedes-Benz is forming an elevated image of their own product to all who enter the museum.
Display Value
SPACE
Space Creation By designing the Mercedes-Benz Museum as a series of continuous, interlocked set of ramps, UN Studio effectively fashioned a giant knot knot of concrete. concrete. This knot knot essentially creates spaces by developing the areas under, over and around the unadorned concrete structure. Through a continuous folding and striation of a single homogenous element, numerous different spaces are delineated. By focusing on the pedestrian pathway and its form, the interstitial spaces inhabited by exhibits materialize.
Spatial Demarcation These interstitial spaces again pose some comparison to that of the automobile. An infrastructural framework is first built, establishing and demarcating a particular inhabitable space, clearly defining an inside and outside. This space can then be expropriated and inhabited by the users.
Variable Continuum Display 1926
2012 The space created by and within the form of this building is one of neutrality. UN Studio essentially created a concrete and glass shell to be inhabited by exhibits and visitors. The vast, open spaces of the museum museum are all interconnected and act as a larger, singular singular space that encompasses the entire assemblage assemblage of exhibits. The individual exhibits may be unique, but the encompassing nature of of the space acts to make each level and display era work as a part within a larger whole. This ambiguity also allows the curators of the museum to swap exhibits over time as necessary, as the building lends itself to continuous display alteration. As new features are created and old ones grow stagnant, stagnant, exhibits and cars can be replaced and the museum building will still act as a perfect neutral backdrop to showcase the vehicles. In this sense, the museum acts as a static yet adaptable space through which time glides, highlighting whatever era the curator currently desires.
The location of this museum as a nodal home for Mercedes-Benz in Germany acts as an anchor in space. Though Mercedes-Benz vehicles can and literally do exist everywhere on the planet, their country of origination serves as a focal point through which the cars are born, and also where the pre-eminent return to be showcased. The museum draws upon the achievements of the company and its global experience, aggregating into a common home, creating a space nearly to that of worship. The end result of UN Studio’s efforts has resulted in a dominant architectural node that acts centrally in a complex, hierarchical multi-national network. Working as both a local and global tourist attraction - a literal cultural shrine for the German-born automobile - the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart is that of a modern museum typology deeply rooted in architectural theory and the proud home of Mercedes-Benz’s exemplary history.
Nodal Anchor
REFERENCES Ben Van Berkel and Caroline Bos, Buy Me a Mercedes Benz, (Barcelona: Actar, 2006) Ben Van Berkel and Caroline Bos, UN Studio Design Models: Architecture Urbanism Infrastructure, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2006) Falk Jaeger, UN Studio, (Calbe: Jovis Verlag GmbH, 2009) “Mercedes-Benz Museum,” ArchDaily, ArchDaily, Accessed December 1, 2012, http://www.archdaily.com/72802/mercedes-benz-museum-unhttp://www.archdaily.com/72802/mercedes-benz-museum-unstudio-photos-by-michael-schnell/ “Mercedes-Benz Museum,” UN Studio, Accessed December December 1, 2012, http://www.unstudio.com/projects/mercedes-benz http://www.unstudio.com/projects/mercedes-benz-museum -museum “Tornado World Record at Mercedes-Benz Museum Stuttgart,” YouTube, accessed December 1, 2012, http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=79XVdJRKhE0
