The Art Newspaper

V&A goes underground for new exhibition space

Design competition looks to keep costs down, with option for future expansion

By Martin Bailey. Web only
Published online: 25 August 2010

Snohetta's design for the V&A's Boilerhouse Yard

The Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) is to launch a design competition by October for a new building on Exhibition Road, on the site of what was to have been the “Spiral”. The Daniel Libeskind-designed Spiral (providing a new entrance, public facilities and galleries) was dropped in 2004, because of problems raising the £70m required for its construction.

Museum director Mark Jones describes the new venture as an “austerity or minimal project”, since it will not involve building above ground, but is essentially a new basement. It will provide purpose-built temporary exhibition galleries, freeing the area which is currently used and giving more space for the permanent collection, particularly fashion, photography and Asian art.

The museum has already asked eight international architects to produce concept designs and models for what is now being called the Exhibition Road Building. Those invited include Heneghan Peng (the Dublin-based architects’ studio behind the Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo) and Snøhetta (the Oslo-based firm responsible for the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art expansion). Their models are currently on display, until 19 September.

Seeing the models has encouraged V&A trustees to proceed with a design competition. The brief will be to create underground exhibition galleries (to a total area of 1,500 sq metres), with a public courtyard on ground level opening out onto Exhibition Road. The existing stone arched screen, designed by Aston Webb and built in 1909 to hide a boilerhouse, will be retained.

Most importantly, the courtyard and basement will need to be designed so that it is possible to build above ground in later years, when there is a need and the economy improves. Although more ambitious ideas for an above-ground building have been discussed since the demise of the Spiral, in the current economic situation the museum wants to embark on a project which is realistic, in terms of costs and timescale.

Although the initial scheme can only be costed once a design is chosen, it is likely to be up to £30m. “The cost will be relatively low for a major museum building project, but it will be big in terms of its impact, in unlocking space,” Jones told The Art Newspaper. The architectural competition will close next summer, and providing fundraising goes well, the new galleries might open by 2015.