Technical Museum Vienna

This year the Technical Museum in Vienna, boasts with a new entrance foyer and museum shop. In the 90s the technical museum faced precisely this difficulty as it tried to gain more space for a larger entrance foyer, a new museum shop and cafe as well as sufficient amenities, cloakroom space and ticketing capacity. The architectural solution was a steel-glass box placed in front of the existing historical structure.

Finally the design solution are multifunctional pieces of furniture made of glass-fibre reinforced plastic and fabric. these ‘trees’ provide seating, shade and acoustic absorption and at night they serve as an illuminate bodies which fill the room with white or blue glowing light. The objects, which resemble trees formally envelope the steel columns and allow a view through the glass ceiling and on to the historical facade. T shop, which has to do with little floor space, receives new, flexible moveable furnishings for the presentation of products – aligned to the overall design principle.

It is a wonderful installation,which reveals a definite architectural statement and communicates with the existing structure and at the same time fulfils the functional requirements of a modern museum entrance.