Prince Charles famously described a planned extension to the National Gallery as a ‘monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much-loved and elegant friend’. Two decades on, and architects Wilkinson Eyre seem to be mocking The Heir with revamp plans that appears to include a swollen pustule erupting on the facade of the Science Museum.
And here’s a close-up:
The excrescence bulges out from behind the fluted columns to reveal a museum that’s “full to bursting with energy and ideas”. I love it. The Science Museum is far and away the most architecturally anonymous of the three South Kensington Museums. For a classical building It could scarcely be more bland. This bold intervention provokes curiosity, pulling the passerby inside to discover more. The galleries will also be remodelled with the addition of a new ‘skyspace’ – a gilded rooftop space dedicated to cosmology.
The plans come on the 100th anniversary of the museum. If they go ahead (and these things are never certain – ask the V&A), the scheme should be complete by 2014.
Someone is going to get a really big needle, and take it to that thing, aren’t they?
That looks like it should be quite exciting when it is finished. Hopefully will get to see it one day!
I really need to start proofreading my posts.