MAXXI Grande – Neubau Mehrzweckgebäude und Freiraumgestaltung am MAXXI National Museum of 21st Century Arts in Rom (IT)

Our proposal for Building A on the Maxxi Campus site is a large three-storey longhouse type that refers to the typology of warehouses rooted in the industrial past of the Quartier. The organisation of the programme allows for maximum distance from the restaurant, while maintaining views of the church from Via Masaccio. The angled roof, optimised for the use of photovoltaic cells, also creates a distance from the upper office floors of the restaurant building. By opening the front part of the volume through a setback with sliding angle, the ground floor, which houses the innovation hub and co-working space, frames the public part of the campus, leaving the space behind the building for the delivery of artworks and a niche for non-human species with wild natural vegetation. Thus, as an independent volume with its differentiated first floor, the building enters into a dialogue with the museum and becomes an active new player on the overall campus. The stepped building volume is spanned by a large umbrella-like roof, creating a larger form that is subordinate in its simplicity and scale to the formal language of the Maxxi Museum. On the one hand, the directed form of the building fits into the linear spatial organisation of the Maxxi Museum; on the other hand, it frames the conclusion of the square. Facing the square, the large screen forms a covered atrium that is open to the sky. This habitable double façade represents a new type of semi-open social space, while providing effective solar shading for the glass façades of the spaces behind it. This innovative space is seen as a vertical extension of the new greenery on the north side of the campus, allowing the public to access the large roof with its lush hanging garden via a series of green platforms. These platforms serve as a communal space for visitors and staff and are naturally ventilated, making them a pandemic-free space for large events, art presentations, lectures and parties.