The Science Museum’s Winton Gallery by Zaha Hadid Architects

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Nick Guttridge

Curator David Rooney’s ambition for the new Winton Gallery at London’s Science Museum is to present mathematics “not as an academic concept, but as a practice that influences technology and enables the environment around us to be transformed”. The appointment of Zaha Hadid Architects to design the gallery was apt – much of its work has emerged from a preoccupation with mathematical logic and geometry, and with the forms and spaces enabled by advances in design technology. The fluid surfaces it seeks “are defined by scientific innovations”, says the architect, “and our design for the mathematics gallery realises such an effort”.

The pivotal exhibit is a prototype Handley Page HP39 ‘Gugnunc’ aircraft, made for a 1929 ‘safe aircraft’ competition, which achieved very short take-off and landing distances. ZHA used computational fluid dynamics to suggest airflows around the suspended aircraft, and this guided the spatial organisation of the gallery. The positioning of more than 100 historic objects, and the production of robust arch-like benches using robotic manufacture, are all intended to embody the mathematical spirit of the brief.

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