David Chipperfield Architects has completed the Zhejiang Museum of Natural History in Anji, a new cultural area near Dipuzhen in eastern China and is renowned for its extensive bamboo forests. The museum has officially been opened on December 29, 2018 to the public. 

The new museum is situated on a sloping site in a large natural park overlooking rice fields in the valley below. Encompassing a total of 58,000-square-metre area, the complex has been designed from a cultural and museological point of view, as the museum operates in a similar way to the Liangzhu Musuem, with single black box exhibition interiors offering adaptability for an undetermined collection including objects of varying scale. 

"The emphasis is therefore placed on the building and its relationship to the landscape," said David Chipperfield Architects. The museum complex creates a composition of eight single-storey pavilions stepping down the hillside frame an open space conceived as a central garden. 

In total the buildings respond to a 12-metre difference in height between the northern and southern boundaries of the site. Their rectangular forms are set at right angles to the slope. 

A loggia, or covered walkway, reminiscent of classical cloisters, mediates between the central garden and the exhibition pavilions, between inside and outside, between the natural and the manmade.

"At the northernmost point, an entrance pavilion welcomes visitors and offers views across the central space and the landscape beyond. On either side of the garden are the exhibition halls," added the firm. 

"These can be visited independently by crossing the garden or in sequence following the stepped loggia."

David Chipperfield Architects use green roofs spilling over the edges of the building, while water features prominently in both the central garden and the larger park. 

For the materiality, the pavilions are painted in red ochre matching the clay earth of the hillside site in which they are embedded, reinforcing the relationship between the museum and landscape.

Project facts

Project start: 2014

Completion: 2018

Gross floor area: 58,000m2

Client: Zhejiang Museum of Natural History

Architect: David Chipperfield Architects Shanghai

Partners: David Chipperfield, Libin Chen, Mark Randel

Project architect: Alessandro Milani (competition) Miguel Angel, Shen Huiwen, Chuxiao Li

Contact architect: Zhejiang South Architecture Design Ltd.

Landscape architect: Levin Monsigny Landschaftsarchitekten (schematic design), Zhejiang South Architecture Design Ltd. (design development)

Structural consultant: Arup

Structural engineer: Zhejiang South Architecture Design Ltd.

Services engineer: Zhejiang South Architecture Design Ltd.

Lighting consultant: Sunlux Lighting Design

All images © Libin Chen

All drawings © David Chipperfield Architects

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