This was an important reconstruction and expansion project. Those architects of the old generation, such as Liang Sicheng, Yang Tingbao, Liu Dunzhen, Xu Jingzhi, and others, successively lead or participated in the design and construction of the project, so the structure deserves to be called a “classic” building. In addition to that, it carried the historical memory of the city. The designer approached the project with great reverence: the new construction was considered the extension of the historic and traditional Nanjing Museum. As a result, the design concept for this project was: “expansion, integration, and restructuring.”

View of the old main hall and the distant mountain from the newly built cultural heritage gallery. Image Courtesy of CCTN Design

Sections and Elevations

Exhibition Hall. Image Courtesy of CCTN Design

After careful measuring and calculation, the Old Great Hall has been elevated by 9.84 feet (3 meters) on the same spot, so the building no longer lays lower than the city streets themselves. This has been achieved without making any impact on the building itself or to the natural outline of Purple Mountain, all the while minimizing the need for extensive underground earthworks, greatly improving the state of the building and making it easier to comprehensively streamline and organize both the aboveground and belowground areas of the complex.

Gallery of intangible cultural heritage. Image Courtesy of CCTN Design

Sketch

Facade Detail. Image Courtesy of CCTN Design

The facades of the architecture have a unified design, made up of hanging stone materials with a texture of pale gray and cinnabar dots and lines on the surface, rendered in a classic look so that the overall structure takes on a rough but reserved appearance, both tender and stately. It was decided for the interior to be decorated with copper plates. The unadorned, decorous, and elegant plating is congenial to the primitive-modern qualities of the overall design, and works well with the glazed roof tiles to bring out the material’s best features.

The original wood stairs with more than 80 years of history are retained for exhibition in the junction area between the old main hall and new building.

Original Wood Stairs At the Junction. Image

The atriums are of various sizes and functions, so as the courtyards, which are meant to interrupt the tediously long course of a visit and make it into a rhythmic one to give visitors a more pleasurable and contemplative experience.

The skylights of the atriums are designed using the reference of “Zaojing,” a traditional decoration in Chinese architecture. The use of copperplate makes it both modern and elegant, creating a unique central hall.

Atrium of gallery of history. Image Courtesy of CCTN Design

Plans

Exhibition Hall. Image Courtesy of CCTN Design

Post-expansion the Nanjing Museum now occupies an underground construction area of more than 322,917 square feet (30,000 square meters). The design uses a 656-foot-long (200-meter-long) underground passage, four sunken courtyards of different sizes, and

Underground light corridor. Image

12 naturally-lit atriums were designed to connect multiple underground exhibition halls, enlivening the underground space while successfully solving the general problems of poor lighting and bad ventilation common to underground public spaces.

Junction area between the reserved old main hall and the newly built gallery of history. Image © Guangyuan Zhang

• Architects

  CCTN Design

• Location

  321 Zhongshan E Rd, Xuanwu Qu, Nanjing Shi, Jiangsu Sheng, China

• Category

  Extension

• Lead Architect

  Taining Cheng

• Associates

  Youfen Wang, Dapeng Wang, Jing Chai, Pengjun Zhang, Huiyu Liu, Xiaoyi Luo, Weifeng Chen, Ying Ying

• Collaborators

  Jiangsu Provincial Architectural Design & Research Institute Ltd,

• Area

  84500.0 m2

• Project Year

  2013

• Photographs

  Guangyuan Zhang