Kengo Kuma's Cave
Kengo Kuma and Associates has unveiled their nature-inspired design for the Museum of Indigenous Knowledge in Manila, the Philippines.
In views from the street and in the café, the renderings make the building appear invisible, lost amid a natural rock formation. Yet the natural rock formation IS the building, an arching structure with a waterfall, pond and tropical plants at its center and climbing plants covering its exterior.
Kuma's firm is quoted at Dezeen: "Based on its concept, we aim to build a natural and organic museum by combining water and green in the cave-shaped space, contrary to the image of museums as closed boxes. It is also an attempt to revive cohabitation of nature and history in the urban environment."
Unfortunately the impression of being inside a rock formation do not extend to the 9,000-square-meter museum's interiors, as this view of the atrium attests.
A targeted completion date, among other details on the fantastical project, are not known at this time.