House of Music

Sou Fujimoto has completed the House of Music, a music museum and concert venue set beneath an undulating roof inspired by the tree canopy in Budapest’s City Park.

The House of Music forms part of the Liget Budapest Project, a cultural masterplan devised to revitalise the vast Városliget or City Park, which includes the construction of several new institutions. A new Museum of Ethnography by Hungarian firm NAPUR Architect and New National Gallery by Japanese practice SANAA are currently under construction, while the restoration of the Museum of Fine Arts, renovation of the park’s botanical gardens and introduction of new outdoor sports facilities have already completed.

The undulating roof form of the building, designed by Sou Fujimoto, is inspired by the tree canopy in the 200-year-old park as well as sound waves. Irregularly shaped holes in the wavering form allow trunks to stretch up through the roof, which is decorated with 30,000 abstract leaf shapes on its underside to evoke the feeling of walking beneath trees.

“We were enchanted by the multitude of trees in the City Park and inspired by the space created by them,” said Sou Fujimoto.

“Whilst the thick and rich canopy covers and protects its surroundings, it also allows the sun’s rays to reach the ground. I envisaged the open floor plan, where boundaries between inside and outside blur, as a continuation of the natural environment.”

A glass curtain wall, reaching 12 metres in height at points, is set back from the edges of the roof canopy encloses the museum.

Within, the 9,000-square-metre building houses exhibition spaces located in basement, a performance area at ground level and education spaces on the roof top.

Visuals have been revealed for the 21st edition of the annual Serpentine Pavilion competition, a drum-shaped structure titled Black Chapel that has been designed by Chicago-based artist Theaster Gates with Adjaye Associates.

A permanent exhibition explores the history of European music, while the House of Museum’s first temporary exhibition is been dedicated to the history of Hungarian pop music from 1957-1993.