Unveiled last week at the Kensington Gardens in London, the Serpentine Gallery’s 10th annual Serpentine Gallery Pavilion commission sets the surrounding greenery ablaze with cascades of red-hot geometry. French architect Jean Nouvel of Ateliers Jean Nouvel was given six months from invitation to completion to conceive and construct the project, which in years past has been designed by the likes of SANAA’s Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa (Japan, 2009), Frank Gehry (U.S., 2008), and artist Olafur Eliasson with Snøhetta’s Kjetil Thorsen (Denmark and Norway, 2007). The pavilion’s program for temporary architecture has been renowned as a site for international architectural experimentation and was the first of its kind when it began in 2000.
Nouvel’s rendition includes awnings that retract and extend from a sloped freestanding wall that stands nearly 40 feet high on the grass like a giant, gleaming façade of hard cinnamon candy. The awnings allow interior and exterior spaces to intersect and play off one another as layers of saturated color unfold. Cantilevered metal structures and lightweight glass, polycarbonate, and fabric help to create a geometric silhouette that contrasts vividly with the surrounding greenery and organic shapes of the park.
The awnings also function as an auditorium that will house the Serpentine Gallery Park Nights and Marathon during rain or shine. The space is at once a public lounge, a café, and venue for Park Nights, the gallery’s program of public talks and events, which attracts up to 250,000 visitors each summer. This year schedule culminates with the Marathon of Maps for the 21st Century on October 16th and 17th, an event exploring the powerful hold of maps on our imaginations and their affect on our perception of geography, scale, and space. Artists, writers, academics and scientists will present maps encompassing their experience of the contemporary world.
During these special events and otherwise, the concept of play abounds, finding literal form in traditional French outdoor table-tennis tables and surfaces for chess and checkers inside. Borrowing from his French homeland’s proclivity for civic parks, Nouvel has placed Frisbees and kites outside, free to the public for use throughout the summer. Stools, banquettes, and compact armchairs of the type you might easily see in office breakout spaces or playrooms accompany picnic-bench-style seating. The pavilion’s searing color, fire engine red, easily compliments the idea of a playground but for Brits it also references their nation’s traditional telephone boxes, post office boxes, and London’s buses – public amenities.
For Nouvel, the pavilion marks his first completed structure in the U.K, which is especially notable since his firm has designed over 200 buildings worldwide. Among them are the iconic Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris (1989), the Culture and Congress Centre, Lucerne (2000), 40 Mercer Street, New York (2008), and the Copenhagen Concert Hall (2009).
Remarkably, the gallery provides no budget for its pavilion commission. Instead, sponsors such as this year’s Arts Council England’s Sustain program foot the bill. In addition, the sale of the completed structured helps to cover 40 percent or less of the cost, and the gallery collaborates with architecture, design, and industry-related firms and individuals. This year Nouvel worked with the structural design and engineering firm Arup, led by David Glover and Ed Clark with Cecil Balmond.
Anyone care to sponsor us via a plane ticket to London? We’d love to trade the New York heat for a glimpse of Nouvel’s red-hot eye candy.
