World’s Spectacular Museum Buildings, Art and architecture development images, gallery designs architects
World’s Most Spectacular Museum Building Designs
post updated 16 February 2026
Art and Architecture Developments across the Globe : Images + Links
29 May 2013
World’s Most Spectacular Museum Developments
Art and Architecture: The World’s Most Spectacular Museums
Hamburg, May 28, 2013 – That time-honored institution, the museum, is gradually being superseded. Increasingly, instead of old-fashioned exhibition rooms, it is gigantic event and experience locations that await the visitor. More often than not designed by star architects, many museums now count among the most impressive buildings of our time. As total works of art, it is not just the treasures within that fascinate, but also the breathtaking symbiosis of exhibits and architecture.
BMW World, Munich, Bavaria, Germany:
photo : Anton Schedlbauer
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France:
photo : Michael Hierner
Centre Pompidou-Metz, Metz, France:
photo : Centre Pompidou-Metz
A selection of the world’s most spectacular museums has now been compiled by a jury of building experts from Emporis, the international provider of building data. The list contains some of the most diverse museum buildings from all over the world – from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, opened in 1959, to the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar.
Experience Music Project, Seattle, Washington, USA:
photo : Alain Lucier
Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain:
photo : Cesar Serrano
Jewish Museum, Berlin, Germany:
photo : Michael Hierner + Maleen Diestel
The most prominent example is star architect Frank O. Gehry’s Guggenheim Bilbao, a building that stands like no other for this new understanding of museum architecture. The shiny silver monumental sculpture was the principal reason for Bilbao’s transformation from a small industrial city into a major international center of art, a transformation that has come to be known as the “Bilbao Effect”. The building continues to this day to influence the architecture of many a 21st-century museum.
Kunsthaus Graz, Styria, Austria:
photos : Maleen Diestel
Maritime Museum Lingang, China:
photo : HG Esch
MAXXI, Rome, Italy:
photo : Jan Martin
Museum design allows architects to play with a very wide range of architectural forms and styles. This can be seen for example in Daniel Libeskind’s deconstructivist works such as the Jewish Museum in Berlin or the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.
His asymmetrical structures of iridescent steel and glass, with sloping floors and walls without right-angles, attract the attention. That an empty architectural shell can draw crowds all by itself was demonstrated by the 350,000 visitors who came to marvel at the Jewish Museum even before it opened.
Museo Soumaya, Mexico City:
photo : Adam Weisman / Rafael Gamo
Museum of Islamic Art, Doha, Qatar:
photo : HG Esch
National Art Center Tokyo, Japan:
photo : Kevin Hemphill
Extravagant structures have their price, however, and it is not uncommon for costs to reach into the hundreds of millions. Nevertheless, the wave of unique museum buildings is not about to ebb. In Lyon, for instance, work is proceeding on the planned completion in 2014 of the Musée des Confluences, a massive civic project designed by Coop Himmelb(l)au. The 190-meter-long structure, a combination of a giant crystal and a cloud, floats eight meters above the ground and will house a museum of science and society.
Oscar Niemeyer Museum, Curitiba, Brazil:
photo : John Lima
Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Ontario, Canada:
photo : Edvard Mahnic
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York City, NY, USA:
photo : Tectonic Photo
World’s Most Spectacular Museum Buildings information / images received from Emporis GmbH.
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