M20 Berlin
M20 Berlin is the proposal for the open competition to extend the Neue Nationalgalerie by Mies van der Rohe. It consists in an urban object that directly answers to the language of the city while using some of the main themes of Mies’ own language: the Podium, the Tower and the Patio.
The project is located in the kulturforum of Berlin so it stands in between the Mies van der Rohe Museum and the Hans Scharoun philharmonic among other iconic buildings around.
It means that another landmark should appear with M20 Museum in dialogue to both them. So, the project proposes a vertical element in the center of the plot that generates two different spaces in both sides: a patio where to see the existing museum and a podium where to contemplate the existing music hall on the other side. Two generous public squares with different conditions but connected throughout the main vertical object.
The complete project is made out of an exposed concrete structure covered with a thin skin of marble printed glass that creates reflections and transparencies along the complete museum experience. Once again, we can see the overlapping of symbolic layers/meanings and the play with the material language created by Mies van der Rohe. Of course, with a contemporary approach and proposing a new use of it. This marble glass allows you to see inside but also reflects the existing iconic buildings of the direct context.
The inside structure of the project is clear and very logical since all the walls on the lower horizontal building are parallel to the Neue Nationalgalerie while in the tower they’re all perpendicular, in the opposite direction. Still all of them are structural elements that support the upper levels and simultaneously define the different and flexible exhibition spaces. The tower is defined by two main vertical elements which create the possibility of a continuous promenade along the exhibition spaces while at the same time create selected views to the philharmonic and to the neue nationalgalerie while going up or down the exhibitions.
