Brandhorst Museum
Urban concept
The Brandhorst Museum is located on Tuerkenstrasse in the Munich district Maxvorstadt. This district, developed in a neo-classical style in the early nineteenth century, during the reigns of Bavarian Kings Maximilian I and Ludwig I, was severely damaged during the Second World War and subsequently rebuilt. The property, with a permissible building footprint of 100m x 34m, forms the north-eastern corner of the Museum Quarter that includes the Alte Pinakothek, the Neue Pinakothek, the Pinakothek der Moderne, the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung, and now, the Brandhorst Museum.
The new building adopts the urban concept of the Pinakothek der Moderne, the second phase of which consists of a 17m high wing to fi ll in the city block along Gabelsbergerstrasse and Tuerkenstrasse, as the historical Tuerkenkaserne once did. The museum continues this building line along Tuerkenstrasse. The corner at Theresienstrasse is marked by increasing the height of the building. As the building façade is set back eight meters further than the original historical buildings to accommodate a row of trees, the head of the building angles out toward the street intersection to define the space here more firmly. The height of the corner element matches that of the apartment building on the opposite side of the street, designed by Sep Ruf, an icon of post war architecture.
By locating the entrance to the Museum at the intersection of Tuerkenstrasse and Theresienstrasse, a symmetry with the southern entrance of the Pinakothek der Moderne at the corner of Tuerkenstrasse and Gabelsbergerstrasse is created, which opens up a connection between the Museum Quarter and the adjacent neighbourhood of Schwabing.
Building
The parts of the museum that are visible above ground consist of a longitudinal building (l=98m, w=18m, h=17m) and a main entrance building (l=34m, w=17m, h=23m). These volumes are connected by a continuous strip window that divides the building visually into two floors. On the “head” at Theresienstrasse, this band flows into the generous glazing of the main entrance. Here, a smaller area of glazing opens the foyer café toward the north and west; additional individual windows provide composed views into and out of the building.
The ground treatment and landscaping to the west reveals the extent of the building underground (w=27m, l=97m, d=15m). The building has three exhibition levels with average floor heights of 9 meters. To the south, the administration and depots are accommodated on eight stacked floors of 3.90 meters each.
In addition to the exhibition areas, foyer, cafe, bookshop, seminar rooms and their ancillary rooms, the building contains rooms for administration and security personnel, a loading bay for art, exhibition workshops, restoration studios and depots. The complex heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems are housed primarily in a continuous subterranean technical area (l=98m, w=8m, h=8m) along the eastern side of the building.
Text from Brandhorst Museum
