Depot Boijmans van Beuningen

Design The Boijmans van Beuningen Collection Building will store the personal collections of museum Boijmans van Beuningen, stichting de Verre Bergen and a number of private art collectors. The building will be erected in the Museumpark in Rotterdam. Part of the Collection Building is open to the public. The private collections are also open to the public a few days a year. Atrium The building houses a large atrium. This is the heart of the building, which is round and has six floors. In the open-plan atrium, you will find staircases linking the different floors. From the reception room on the ground floor, this zigzag route goes upwards through the building to the green public roof with exhibition room, restaurant and sculpture garden. The park, rooftop restaurant and sculpture garden are open to the public. From the roof, which is surrounded by a wind barrier, the public has a panoramic view over Rotterdam. Appearance In the design of the Boijmans Van Beuningen Collection Building, the shape of the building and its reflective façade are what define the building’s overall appearance and are the calling card for the museum. The perception of the reflection’s perfection is affected by the accuracy of the shape. By describing it in mathematical rules – by means of rationalisation – the shape could be determined exactly prior to production. By recognising the curve as a variable, changes in the shape could easily be implemented in late stages of the design, without affecting the current process. The exact shape of the glass panels has been recorded in BIM models (Revit). By linking these models to parametric shape models, it was easy to generate new documentation and thereby respond flexibly to changes in shape.