Müritzeum in Waren, Germany

August 13, 2010 Category: Cultural, Public Buildings

Müritzeum designed by Wingårdh Arkitektkontor AB is located in Waren, Germany, The town of Waren is in the northern part of Müritz. It is a major tourist attraction just over an hour’s drive from Berlin or Hamburg. Wingårdh Arkitektkontor AB were selected to design its visitors centre after a competition.

A high, central room is surrounded by a series of exhibition themes; ice age, fauna, flora, mankind etc, but also by a slit giving direct access to the surrounding park with an older exhibition building and a natural walk around the small Lake Herrensee and a final roof climb to the viewing platform towards Lake Müritz.

Up in the central room, Germany’s largest freshwater aquarium protrudes with a large shoal, advertising the aquarium section one floor below. On the entry level a glassed-in bay window juts out, with lots of binoculars in an eagle’s head, while the lower floor has the exhibition’s pièce de résistance; a seamlessly inserted window in Herrensee’s water and its population of carp. In reality it is a cleaned pond, separated from the murky lake waters.

The bay window, glass in the water and the park bar are all, like the entryway, parallel slits cut through the cones. The roof protrudes powerfully out over the south-facing, double-height glass facade. All the surfaces here are honey yellow, varnished grain rich larch reminding one of the care that a much-loved wooden boat receives.

Müritzeum Design by Wingårdh Arkitektkontor AB