Surface of Confluence, An Infrastructural Museum on the National Mall

Site model

by Zi Meng (MArch I AP ’21)

This project intends to synthetize multiple architectural interests into a wholistic form. Several different aspects including typological organization, social activity, contextual influence and historical connotations are analyzed and instrumentalized to generate an idiosyncratic formal language – the confluence bundled roof system. The project proposes a new form of museum for DC that fuses the infrastructural quality of the bridge together with the singular characteristics of the museum. The geometry of the museum is a product of negotiation between its internal organization of programs and its circulatory bridging functionalities. The confluence roof system is a formal, structural and tectonic solution informed both by the site context and typological study of museums. Its geometry and structural property are adaptive to the complex contextual influences and programmatic requirements. The conflicting and conforming flow of the roof bundles formally responding to the poignant status of the highway severed site, at the same time creating a walkable roof surface that is bridging and suturing the fragmented site parcels. The roof bundle system also provides a porous surface, while walking on the roof bridge of the museum, the visitors can frequently drip down and experience the museum space without going inside of the museum.

 

Section model     Section model

Section model     Site model

Interior rendering     Interior rendering

 

Interior rendering