A Little Museum Store

While only occupying 0.2% of the museum, the design can drastically change the movement and structure of the lobby to give a fresh perspective to different visitors each time. When people spin the cantilevers into different directions, it extends outward and the creation of a totally different space appears. It is another large-scale artwork that spontaneously and playfully lays out into the Taipei Fine Arts Museum lobby. In the 1960s, with the economy in development and the population expanding rapidly after World War II, a group of architects formed the Metabolism movement. Using the core structure of the building as the load-bearing device, the architects of the Metabolism movement developed diverse ways to explore the land and space. Architect Kao, the designer of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, is one of the important figures of the Taiwanese Metabolism movement. The whole floor of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum is more than 24,169 sqm, but The Little Museum Store is only 45 sqm, located in the corner of the lobby. Our challenge here was how to take that small little corner to make the biggest impact possible. While we designed something new, we still kept the memory emphasizing the window of the original booth. It not only stands for a simple shop but also the history of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. We knew the Metabolism concept is the only way to better visualize the design of the gift shop and to further develop the original concept of the building. Through stacking the movable cantilever structures, we created an interesting structure that provides the spatial flexibility which allows visitors to see the ordinary gift shop in a new way every time they visit.