The Historical Museum of the Province of Drenthe, which is housed in a complex of historic buildings, needed expansion. Egeraat proposed to increase its exposition area by 2 thousand m2 at the expense of underground space. The new gallery wing is submerged in the ground, and the entrance to it is arranged in a former coach shed adjacent to the old buildings of the museum.
For this, the barn, one of the oldest buildings, was first moved to carry out construction work, and then returned to its original place, raised on a meter-long glass podium. Its historic façade has been left intact, but the coach house now clearly demonstrates its new function. During the day, the "floating" entrance to the underground wing illuminates the halls through a glazed pedestal, and at night it turns into a spectacular landmark beacon.
From the carriage shed, which features a black-walled lobby, visitors descend into a snow-white underground space entirely dedicated to exhibitions. Immediately behind the spectacular front staircase, there is a large exhibition hall, the ceiling of which bends with wide ribbons, forming elongated "dormer" windows. Outside, the smooth curves of the stepped roof turn out to be the relief of an artificial park with ponds and paths, covering the new building from above and integrating into the system of Assen's existing gardens and parks. The sun's rays penetrate the interior through light wells.
Thus, in the Egeraat project, the reconstruction boiled down not only to the spatial expansion of the museum, but also gave rise to a change in its navigational structure (the old museum premises received a modern entrance, connecting them with the attached wing), as well as the consistent integration of the museum ensemble into the urban fabric. All these factors at one time determined the unconditional victory of the project in an architectural competition held by the authorities of the province of Drenthe.
N. K.
