July 23.2015
Society changes but buildings remain firmly in their place. And so, it
follows that the purpose for which a building was initially built will
eventually have to be revised. Thus, most buildings will at some point
enevitably face a conversion of either its original program or structure, or
both.
Often the succes of a building transformation relies heavily on the
architect's ability to balance old functions with new, as well as to employ the
history of the building to frame its future use. Noteworthy examples of such
considerate conversions include Peter Zumthor's Kolumba Museum in Cologne
and Hiroshi Sambuichi's Seirensho Art Museum on the island of Inujima, Japan.
In these cases, the past and the present functions are interrtwined and
almost indistinguishable from one another, whereas in MVRDV's converted
silos at the Copenhagen harbour front and Herzog & de Meuron's Caixa Forum
the opposite seems to be the case: the new functions cling on to the existing
building in an almost parasitic way. In this way, the difference between the
old and the new function are emphasized.
