Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects state, “In human experience there is no greater contrast than the conditions of peace and war.” For the Museum of the Second World War International Competition they wanted to highlight this contrast. The architecture of the museum building and its landscapes posits the conditions of contrast that invoke contemplation of the contradictions that war overlays onto human endeavor. Ultimately, the magnification and illumination of the museum’s message is the project of the architecture and the landscape.
Architect: Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects Location: Gdansk, Poland Project Team: Mack Scogin , Merrill Elam, Alan Locke, Rubi Xu, Greg Tran, Jared Serwer, Christopher Hoxie, Helen Han, Margaret Fletcher, Barnum Tiller, Mathew Weaver, Barrett Feldman, Ted Paxton Landscape Architect: Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates Landscape Project Team: Michael Van Valkenburgh, Izabela Riano ,Nicholas Pevzner Structural Engineer: Jane Wernick Associates Mechanical Engineer: Max Fordham Mechanical Engineer Team: Henry Luker, Mark Nutley Façade Consultant Team: Front, Bruce Nichol, Zach Wiegand Cost Consultant Team: Turner Townsend, Colin Wood Project Area: 22,330 sqm Competition Year: 2010
The museum landscape is suspended between a calm refuge and a tumultuous history—an archetype of the symbolic Polish forest transported to Gdansk. Like the landscape Adam Mickiewicz describes in “Pan Taduesz,” the Polish forest has been a refuge maintaining the continuity of Polish identity in times of political turmoil. Monumental trees symbolize the fatherland, and ancientness is felt everywhere.
