"Louvre II" will appear in the town of Lance near Lille, on the border with Belgium. Thus, the authors of the idea hope to achieve two goals simultaneously: to make more of the museum's collections available to the public and to stimulate the development of the economy in one of the undeveloped regions of France.
SANAA, renowned for its projects for museums in the United States and Europe - including the New Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Valencia, outpaced 120 other architecture firms, with Zaha Hadid and Rudy Ricciotti competing in the final.
Thus, this workshop repeated the success of their compatriot Shigeru Bana, according to whose project a branch of the Pompidou Center in Metz is being built.
Henri Loyrette, director of the Louvre, defined the main function of the new museum in this way: to teach people to see art in a new way. More than 20% of the project budget (total amount - 75 million euros) will be spent on the museology section, which implies the main role of the content in comparison with the visual image in its concept.
In the Louvre II, the exhibits will be displayed not according to the chronological and geographical principle, as in the Paris museum, but thematically, which will contribute to the implementation of the educational function of the institute.
The new complex will be an ensemble of separate buildings grouped around the glass volume of the lobby. They will be erected in the middle of a landscape park, on the site of an old mine. Most of the enclosures will be lined
polished sheets of aluminum, which should reflect the surrounding green like a mirror, thereby better blending into the natural environment. These one-storey buildings will be lined up in a row 450 m long.
The foyer will appear at the entrance to the old mine. It will be located so that it would be possible to cross the site through it without entering the museum.
Membranes on the glass ceilings of the new galleries will filter sunlight to prevent excess lighting from damaging the exhibits. The layout gives the curators maximum freedom to create interiors for each specific exhibition.
In addition, the ensemble will include administrative premises, an auditorium "Scene" for 350 seats and a restaurant.
