5 Teams Shortlisted in British Museum International Architectural Competition

The international architectural competition being run by Colander Associates on behalf of the British Museum launched in May of this year with an open call for expressions of interest from teams. More than sixty teams submitted applications, “ranging across six continents and an exciting range of experience,” per a statement from the British Museum, and “from recently formed practices to long-established firms.”

The lead architects for the five shortlisted teams are predominantly British (3 teams) but also hail from France and The Netherlands. Long-established firms are also in the majority, with just two of the five leads established this century. If one firm rises above the rest, at least in terms of relevant experience, it is David Chipperfield Architects, whose restoration work on the Neues Museum in Berlin has been widely praised since its completion in 2009; and given that the original Neues Museum building, like the British Museum's original Greek Revival building designed by Sir Robert Smirke, opened in the 1850s.

Here is the list of the shortlisted teams:

• Team 1: 6a Architects, with: Advanced Integrated Solutions, Arup, David Bonnett Associates, Gitta Gschwendtner, Kellenberger-White, London School of Architecture, Purcell, Studio ZNA
• Team 2: David Chipperfield Architects, with: AEA Consulting, Adamson Associates, Alan Baxter Associates, Arup, Atelier Brückner, Atelier Ten, Lobe Lloyd, Julian Harrap Architects, Plan A, Reusefully, Neal Shasore
• Team 3: Eric Parry Architects and Jamie Fobert Architects, with: Buro Happold, David Bonnett Associates, Max Fordham, Mima, Price & Myers,
  Purcell, Space Syntax, Studio ZNA
• Team 4: Lina Ghotmeh — Architecture, with: Ali Cherri, Arup, Holmes Studio, Plan A, Purcell
• Team 5: OMA, with: Arup, Benoy, Cookies, dUCKS Sceno, EQ2 Lighting, Purcell, Salvatore Settis, Studio ZNA

The teams in the second stage of the two-stage competition “will be asked to expand on how they might approach this specific project.” This per Colander Associates, who further explains: “This is not a competition to judge a finished design for the Western Range. It is a competition to find a visionary team with which the museum can work, to conceive and deliver an exceptional design solution that is full of creative endeavor, while also being functional, realizable and operational.”

Specifically, the competition is addressing the Western Range, whose galleries sit to the west of the Great Court and encompass a third of the British Museum's exhibition space. The museum, whose overall footprint totals 100,000 m² (1 million sf), is in the early stages of a larger masterplan that “over time, will see a complete reimagination of its physical as well as conceptual landscape,” and of which the competition is just one component. Per the competition brief, the project “offers the museum an opportunity to make a statement of its future intent, through reimagined galleries, new state-of-the-art storage facilities and engaging contemporary architecture, in juxtaposition to the highly significant and already celebrated listed buildings on the site.”

The competition entrants are being asked, per the statement from the museum, to “respond to the museum’s sensitive historic buildings, ambitious decarbonization plans, and the ongoing process of reimagining the display and care of collections.” It is spelled out a little bit more in the competition brief: “The primary aim of this project is to enhance the visitor experience and offer the museum a series of renewed gallery and collection storage spaces that allow the extraordinary permanent collections to be cared for, researched and displayed for modern audiences. Importantly the museum is also looking to resolve the current problems it is facing of an over-complex and constricted site with a dilapidating building stock that is poorly suited to its requirements.”

Stage two of the competition will start in September and the winner is expected to be announced in February 2025. The winner will be selected by a ten-person Jury Panel consisting of: 

• George Osborne (Jury chair), Chair of the British Museum’s Board of Trustees
• Nicholas Cullinan, Director, British Museum
• Tracey Emin, Trustee, British Museum
• Yvonne Farrell, Director, Grafton Architects
• Mark Jones, Interim Director, British Museum
• Meneesha Kellay,  Senior Curator, Contemporary at the Victoria and Albert Museum
• Charlie Mayfield, Trustee, British Museum
• Alejandro Santo Domingo, Trustee, British Museum
• Mahrukh Tarapor, Museum Professional
• Sarah Younger, Project Director of NG 200, National Gallery London