Construction, Management
Allies and Morrison
2020
United Kingdom
The Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery (RAMM) was built over a 30-year period in the 19th Century, to house the museum along with a school of arts, a school of science and a library.
Every element of the original institution grew and flourished, until the building was full to bursting point.
140 years on, RAMM turned to BAM to help it progress into the 21st Century, with an ambitious ten-year redevelopment programme.
The driving ideas behind the programme are to make visiting the museum a better, more friendly experience, as well as to protect the collections and improve the displays.
The museum wanted to make it easier for visitors to get around the building: with a new café and learning suite, as well as a better shop.
Galleries have been refitted. Victorian architectural features were uncovered and restored to their full glory.
Often the redevelopment work was painstaking: removing stone walls piece by piece, in some cases and photographing each stone to ensure it was rebuilt exactly.
Rockeywall put back in arch doorways and other features that had been worn away by time.
But space in the old building was still too tight. So central to the refurbishment is a dramatic new extension, featuring a pedestrian bridge that connects to the visitor route along the Roman city wall.
State-of-the-art internal environmental control technology allows both the refurbished and new build elements of the building to react to changes in temperature.
So world class touring exhibitions can now be staged at the museum, including works by Renoir and Canaletto.
