The public Art Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen is a new building typology that will be realised on the northern edge of Rotterdam's Museumpark, the heart of the city’s cultural campus. This new addition to the existing museum will become a new cultural landmark for Rotterdam, alongside world-class institutions that are already in the area including Kunsthal, Het Nieuwe Instituut, Chabot Museum and Sonneveld House. Residents, art lovers and visitors to the city will experience the museum’s collection in a specially commissioned atrium and exhibition spaces that allow 90% of the building to be public including artworks in storage. It is also intended that collection display changes bi-annual based on themes.
MVRDV’s competition-winning design for the 15,000 sq m art depot will store the esteemed collection of 70,000 art and design objects amassed from 1849 till the present combined with restoration facilities, exhibition spaces, offices, logistics, a bar, restaurant, public roof terrace, and private collectors facilities.
It will also have spaces not accessible to the general public that are for logistics, quarantine and rooms for private art collections whose owners can visit their art and enjoy it in private spaces. This is a new commercial service offered by the museum and additionally, depots and an exhibition space run by the philanthropic foundation, De Verre Bergen will also be located in the new collection building.
The official ceremony to break ground on the construction of the new collection building - Public Art Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen was held on Friday 17th March 2017 at 14:30 together with Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam City Council, De Verre Bergen Foundation, MVRDV, IMD structural engineers, RHDHV consultants, Peutz Building Physics, ABT Facade Engineers, BAM Construction and Engineering and other stakeholders.
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Nick Myall
News editor
