The New Rijksmuseum

Amsterdam, Netherlands

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The New Rijksmuseum

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Firm

Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos

Type

Cultural › Museum

YEAR

2013

SIZE

25,000 sqft - 100,000 sqft

BUDGET

$100M +

The intervention on the building was, initially, meant to open up a new and unique entrance to the museum entrance in the central passage hall, and secondly, to recover the courtyards and exhibition spaces, regaining somewhat their original state, or at least their dimensions.

The first of these purposes could not be achieved due to the radical opposition of the cyclists, but it was possible to generate a large central hall to link the east and west courtyards of the building under the passage. The large space generated by opening and connecting courtyards houses all essential uses for visitors, and offers a suitable space on the scale that the grandeur of the building deserves. You enter this hall from the passageway, and the tours to the exhibition areas start at this point, linking with the original grand stairs.

In the new space created, natural limestone has been used as a basic material, a stone of a type not present in other areas of the building, but which allows us to unite the old and the new without complacency in the juxtaposition or contrast. This same material was used in the two new small interventions carried out in the garden. The courtyards, with a slightly sloping ground, are connected under the passage, and on each of them a structure with an acoustic and lighting mission has been suspended, called "the chandeliers".