The Israel Museum - Archaeology Wing
Year: 2005 -2010
Area: 3,000 sqm
Client: The Israel Museum
Status: Built
Original architect: Al Mansfeld and Dora Gad
Exhibition Design: Pentagram, London
Team: Carmit Hernik-Saar, Hila Rak-Broides, Ruth Kedar
Project Management: Ira Davelman, Am-Gar Project Management Ltd.
Structural Engineering: Yossi Gordon
Project Description
The Archaeology Wing project was a delicate preservation project which entailed the restoration of both the external stone envelopes and the internal exposed concrete walls, ceilings and columns. Our work on this wing included reorganization of the circulation into a longer and a shorter narrative path (including the addition of new modules to enable a loop movement); re-opening of windows to allow views to the outside and (diffused) natural light; stabilizing the central hypar-columns (“mushrooms”) and the cantilever roofs; re-routing the drainage system; inserting a new electrical and HVAC systems; and exposing the original texture of the brutalist walls and ceilings. EKA has also done the working drawings for the interior layout and display cabinets designed by Pentagram.
The Israel Museum
Year: 2003-2010
Site area: 80,000 sqm
Pre-existing built area: 50,000 sqm
New built area: 6,000 sqm
Construction budget: 100,000,000 USD
Client: The Israel Museum
Status: Built
Original architect: Al Mansfeld and Dora Gad
Collaboration: James Carpenter Design Associates
CD: A. Lerman Architects
Team: Carmit Harnik Saar, Ruth Kedar, Rinat Shteinlauf, Hila Rak-Broides, Dan Koniac, Charlotte Mottahedeh.
Project Management: Nizan-Inbar Project Management Ltd.
Structural Engineering: J. Kahan & Partners.
Project Description
The renewal of the Israel Museum in Jerusalem is a project of renovation, reorganization and expansion of the national museum designed by architects Al Mansfeld and Dora Gad in a 1959 competition and opened in 1965. The original museum was conceived as an open-ended accumulative system with inbuilt possibilities to evolve and mutate within a fixed grid and according to modular increments.
Indeed, the prospect of unrelenting growth has proved justified and the museum has multiplied its floor area ten times within about 40 years without losing its mathematical composition.
The incredible growth of the museum has brought it to the brink of an organizational and operational collapse. While the initial design system had been successful in maintaining the appearance of formal coherence, internally the colossal structure became unsustainable, out of scale and at odds with its own program.
We were commissioned to draft a new master plan for the museum in order to resolve the internal organizational problems, reorganize the entrance and circulation system and speculate on potential areas for further expansion.
Our proposal was based on a subtle strategic intervention that consolidated the existing cellular structures and added missing links that would allow the museum complex to function again. The intervention included a new entrance and ticket pavilion with a generous forecourt; an inserted passage leading to a new core element from which all internal galleries and departments of the Museum are accessed; reorganization of all galleries for better accessibility, orientation and visibility; and finally preservation work which included rehabilitation of external stone facing and internal exposed concrete surfaces and restoration of natural lighting in the exhibition spaces.
All stages, from conceptual master plan to internal fit out, have been carried out on schedule and on budget. The Israel Museum re-opened to the public on July 2010.
With the conclusion of the project, EKA is proud to put forward two unusual achievements: First, albeit the massive structural, spatial and material transformations, the museum has kept its original sense of place, set of proportions and spatial flow. Second, while adding less than 10% to the existing envelope of the museum, we managed to double its exhibition area by considerably improving its internal performance.