BIG set to top Museum for Paper Art with "a single sheet of paper"

Danish architecture studio BIG is expanding a former Aldi supermarket in North Jutland, Denmark, to create a museum with a folded roof that emulates a sheet of paper.

Named Museum for Paper Art, the building is being developed by BIG in collaboration with psaligrapher Bit Vejle to celebrate the history of paper art in Denmark.

It is set to transform the 900-square-metre former supermarket into a 2,300-square-metre museum, marked by a roof intended to evoke a sheet of folded paper that has landed on the site.

The old building, once occupied by supermarket chain Aldi, is currently home to the existing Museum for Paper Art that Vejle opened in 2018.

"In collaboration with Bit, we have designed a simple concept that allows a single sheet of paper to drape over the site and the existing building," said BIG partner David Zahle.

"By treating the roof surface as such – a single sheet of folded paper – existing and new functions are brought together in one unifying gesture," added the studio's founder Bjarke Ingels.

"An obsolete supermarket finds new life under the floating curved roof," Ingels continued.

According to BIG, the Museum for Paper Art is "the only specialised museum for paper fine crafts and design in the Nordics".

Its expansion is projected to double the annual number of visitors every year.

The roof of the Museum for Paper Art will sweep over the site, encompassing the existing building as well as new public spaces around its edges. It will be connected to the ground via large panes of glass that flood the interiors with light.

Beneath the roof, various surfaces will be lined with white bricks as well as timber, which will nod to the process of using wood to make paper. The walls of the existing building will be updated with a layer of paper art, developed by BIG with several paper artists.

Inside the Museum for Paper Art will be exhibition areas alongside spaces for workshops and events, offices and storage facilities.

Among the exhibits will be hand-folded lampshades by Danish brand Le Klint and papercuttings by Danish author Hans Christian Andersen.

Completing the museum will be a landscape of native plants and trees, through which a path will wind to "invite the public to explore the surroundings", BIG said.

A pond with stepping stones will be positioned beneath the sweeping roof's lowest point, collecting rainwater as it cascades off its sloped surface.

BIG is an architecture studio that was founded by Ingels in 2005. It has studios in Copenhagen, New York, Barcelona and London.

Elsewhere, the studio is currently developing a waterfront art museum in Suzhou with swooping roof planes and a "spherical armadillo" ballpark for The As in Las Vegas.

The visuals are by Wizarch courtesy of BIG.

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