Sergison Bates architects . Jaccaud Spicher architectes . renders: © Office 360 360
Sergison Bates and Jaccaud Spicher have won the competition for the expansion and transformation of the Musée gruérien in Bulle, in the Swiss canton of Fribourg. The existing building opened in 1972 and was extended in 2002, but since then a significant increase in the number of visitors and the need to improve accessibility have prompted the Municipality to launch a competition inviting a radical rethink.
The project proposes a reconfiguration of the existing volume into a composition that is uniform in its expression but articulated into pavilions to house a complex programme that includes museum facilities, a public library, temporary exhibition spaces and public access areas.
The composition of volumes reflects the complexity of the interior program and the history of a place which is particularly symbolic for the town of Bulle. The horizontal emphasis of the ensemble integrates the town’s medieval castle into a new skyline, embedding it into the surrounding landscape.
From the entrance on the ground floor visitors are offered various routes through the building. The generous transitional space at the threshold of the museum lend itself to being used as a museum shop, a café, or for the temporary display of museographic items. Visible form the street, it is a showcase for the public and passers-by.
The roof provides an orientation grid, pierced by the large skylights that indicate routes through the building, creating an inner landscape that structures the experience of the whole, while highlighting individual elements.
The dominance of timber as a structural material offers a durable solution and will characterise the interior spaces, giving them a strong, warm presence, the materiality of the roof and of the external surface echoes that of the original building, creating a subtle shift between the memory of the existing place and its reconfiguration.
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