Toward a new vision to design a museum in historical places

• Main Authors: Baher I. Farahat, Khaled A. Osman
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Taylor & Francis Group 2018-04-01
• Series: HBRC Journal
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1687404816000055

Some movements within modern architecture particularly emphasize the importance of matching buildings to their surroundings. However, practicing such “contextual architecture” is highly challenging and typically not something the future inhabitants of a building are well equipped for participating in. This paper attempts to be a new vision to design an important building in such sensitive places, for example, designing a museum in a historical context. The methodology of the study is a qualitative method based on a theoretical foundation. It sheds light on the concepts and definition of museums and contextualism, and answers the main question proposed in this paper: “How can we design a huge and important building such as a museum in historical context while respecting its importance and at the same time avoiding the deterioration of this historical place?” And based on answering the sub following questions too: What is the museum concept? What are the activities and functions of this prototype? What is the museum form and morphology? What are the types of contextual design? What are the strategies of contextual design? This part ends with electing some criteria that will be used as basis for the practical part. And thus it can be concluded the ideal strategy for designing a museum in historical context. Discussion of the findings is expected to enrich the talk in that domain. Keywords: Urban design, Built environment, Creative design, Design strategy, Contextual design