The museum as a building type and architectural space bear a complex relationship to each other. Architecture competes with the exhibited objects on the one hand and gives way to them on the other, enabling the museum to develop as regards content. This manual guide has its point of departure between both poles and targets both designers and users. The aim of the publication is to facilitate communication in the planning process of a museum, whether this is during the conceptual stage, the competition, or the design and construction phase. In addition to an introduction on the architectural history of the museum, the authors examine the key planning parameters involved in the conception and design of a contemporary museum. Buildings and projects provide inspiration for individual design work.0.

Museums are architectural trend-setters. Culture sponsoring and their increasing role as tourist attractions are guarantees for an ongoing boom in museum construction. A tradition and typology developed over the centuries, the experience gained in recent decades and cutting-edge technology all contribute to the practice of modern day museum building. History and form, site development, floor plan, air-conditioning and climate technology are just some examples of the subjects treated systematically in the first section of this design manual. Some 70 international museum case-studies exemplify solutions and emphasize specific museum design issues such as spatial organisation and arrangement, and lighting. Paul von Naredi-Rainer is an expert on the subject of museum construction and author of the widely read "Architektur und Harmonie" (Architecture and Harmony). Herbert Pfeiffer, Helmut F.O. MÃ1⁄4ller and Hans JÃ1⁄4rgen Schmitz teach at Dortmund University, Oliver Hilger and Gerhard Kahlert at RWTH Aachen.

In an era of expanded responsibility and constricted funding, museum personnel often need strong practical guidance on the best practices for building projects. The authors of Planning Successful Museum Building Projects discuss the reasons for undertaking building projects (new construction, renovation, expansion), the roles and responsibilities of key players, the importance of a strong vision, and the best methods for selecting architects and construction firms. They also offer in-depth information about budgeting and finance, feasibility studies, capital campaigns, marketing, and communications, as well as advice on how to live through the disorienting process of construction, manage post-opening needs, and evaluate the project's success over time. Planning Successful Museum Building Projects provides all the tools for successfully managing projects from predesign through opening and beyond.

A characteristic trait of the maritime museums is that they are often located in a contemporary and/or historical environment from which the collections and narratives originate. The museum can thereby be directly linked to the site and its history. It is therefore vital to investigate the maritime museums in terms of relationships between landscape, architecture, museum and collections. This volume unravels the kinds of worlds and realities the Nordic maritime museums stage, which identities and national myths they depict, and how they make use of both the surrounding maritime environments and the architectural properties of the museum buildings.

Museums are among the iconic buildings of the twenty-first century, as remarkable for their architectural diversity as for the variety of collections they display. But how does the architecture of museums affect our experience as visitors? This book proposes that by seeing space as common ground between architecture and museology, and so between the museum building and its display, we can illuminate the individuality of each museum and the distinctive experience it offers - for example, how some museums create a sense of personal exploration, while others are more intensely didactic, and how the visit in some cases is transformed into a spatial experience and in other cases into a more social event. The book starts with an overview of the history of museum buildings and display strategies, and a discussion of theoretical and critical approaches. It then focuses on specific museums as in-depth case studies, and uses methods of spatial analysis to look at the key design choices available to architects and curators, and their effects on visitors’ behaviour. Theoretically grounded, methodologically original, and richly illustrated, this book will equip students, researchers and professionals in the fields of architecture, museum studies, curating, exhibition design, and cultural studies, with a guide for studying museums and a theoretical framework for their interpretation.

This spectacular volume celebrates the reopening of the Milwaukee Art Museum with its new additiion designed by world-famous Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, joining the original builing by Eero Saarinen.

This volume addresses the most influential Victorian building in the city of Dublin and explores the new standard which it set in the use of Irish decorative stone, the employment of native craftsmen and the unprecedented eclecticism of its design. The geology, quarrying, building, carving and architectural design which created this spectacular structure are explored in a series of papers by established scholars and experts in the field. The book is richly illustrated in full colour to capture the sumptuous polychromy of the building and the profuse detail of its carved ornament.