In the hub of Hyde Park and Kensington Garden in London, from 10 June to 9 October, the usual appointment with architecture and design promoted by Serpentine Gallery returns.
Conceived in 2000 by the director Julia Peyton-Jones, the initiative is now internationally known as a symbol of architectural experimentation, which over the years has involved projects of various world-famous architects.
After Selgascano, the Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) studio signed then the Serpentine Pavilion 2016, focusing on the design of a “decompressed wall” that transforms from a straight line into a three-dimensional space creating a great visual impact structure built on 300 square meters. Coffee bar during the day and ideal location for the many night-time events for artists, writers and musicians, the pavilion embodies many aspects often perceived as opposite sides of the same coin. Its willowy form, designed by the architects of the studio founded in 2005 by Bjarke Ingels in Copenhagen, appears therefore also rigid, modular but sculptural, characterized at the same time by transparencies and opaque effects.
Behind the project there is an element considered one of the backbones of the architecture itself: the brick wall, which for the occasion is revisited in a three-dimensional way. The wall, erected on a structure of pultruded fiberglass profiles stacked one on top of the other, is dismembered to form a cavity in its interior, used to accommodate the scheduled meetings. The straight line, that comes to life at the top, drop sloping softening to the ground, so as to form a gulch for the entrance to the pavilion. The play of lights also catches the eye, not only implemented by the shape of the building, but also by the material that covers it.
The influx and movement of the public inside and outside then will help to emphasize this already vibrant mix of reflections and shadows on the arched walls. The construction is completed by the wood used for the paving and the extruded Fiberline profiles, from whose mixture comes a suggestive and enchanting effect. This peculiar interpretation of the pavilion wall, located at the center of the park, makes possible a different view of the structure, according to the location by which it is observed. Its contradictory, and therefore interesting, nature reveals itself just in the polyhedral shapes: the silhouette appears rectangular on one side and triangular on the other, wavy and clear, opaque and translucent.
Photo credits © Bjarke Ingels Group