Machine Museum
Machine Museum
Robotics is a future-driven field which is rapidly evolving with advancements in science and technology. It is in state of flux with open-ended possibilities. The museum is hence conceptualized as a lab or workshop, a medium for the experimental and application-based nature of the field, rather than a static repository of robotic history. The Machine Museum Workshop is a place which showcases robotic achievement and encourages learning of robot science through education and hands-on experiences.
An inside-out approach in the spatial expression of the museum has been used wherein the main exhibition and working spaces are rugged boxes suspended within a steel exoskeleton. The main services and ducts, the innards of the building too have been boldly exposed.
The Machine Museum Workshop is flanked by the art street to the south and extends to the east with an art meets robot science display. To enhance the active public street presence, the main museum starts on the first floor, freeing up ample ground space for a plaza.
The plaza acts as a common entry space for both the proposed photography museum and the robot museum. The lobby extends into a voluminous atrium-like space. The cafe and museum shop beyond the lobby and atrium draw in the visitors and complete the open and public nature of the ground plane.
The exposed circulation core connects the shifting blocks in the vertical plane, articulating the spatial experience. This also creates smaller scale public spaces on each floor and allows easy connections to the neighboring photography museum at multiple levels.
The idea of a robot integrated into our human lives is an evolving one and hence the museum reflects that. The building is viewed as a dynamic object, not complete and absolute, and one can see the inside working of the “live” museum from the street.
2019 – Competition