From afar, the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi appears almost as a white city on Saadiyat Island, a place that has become a museum in its own right — of contemporary architecture by a who’s who of global firms. Next to Jean Nouvel’s Louvre Abu Dhabi, Foster + Partners’ Zayed National Museum and Frank Gehry’s soon-to-open Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, the Natural History Museum is less look-at-me: grand in scale yet driven more by a journey of discovery than a signature, and stylistic, formal expression.
The 35,000-square-metre building, designed by Dutch firm Mecanoo (in collaboration with EGIS, Broadway Malyan, Pascal+Watson and WAHO, the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi), spreads out capaciously from the centre of its 82,000-square-metre site while also reaching impressive heights through its staggered massing.
And though this is a crisp orthogonal structure, clad in gleaming white, pinstriped concrete, it is informed by rugged outcroppings more than anything else, according to the firm. “The museum is conceived as a landscape shaped by natural forces,” Mecanoo’s official press release states, “where architecture and terrain become inseparable.” They explain that the project was inspired by the region’s geological formations and wadis — the dry riverbeds, surrounded by mountainous rock formations, that fill with water and become prime swimming spots after heavy rains.
The museum’s main, repeated geometry is that of a pentagon, multiplied like cellular structures to create a crystalline footprint in plan. This form is realized in concrete and steel, with thick building masses — like the thick-walled buildings of the region — augmented by additional passive design measures such as openings and shaded outdoor spaces. The white facades are made locally with ultra-high-performance concrete, and the building is filled with planters that act as additional “thermal buffers” and continue the landscape indoors from out, where sustainable irrigation systems “support a resilient planting strategy adapted to the local climate.”
To reach the building, visitors can walk along three public pathways that “flow through the landscape, connecting the waterfront with the surrounding cultural institutions of Saadiyat Island.” Even without a ticket, locals and tourists have access to the site, which includes terraces, shaded passages and other public spaces. The first room they enter cracks the building open like a geode: Conceived as a “dramatic threshold between the city, the landscape and the world of natural history contained within,” the entrance lobby displays the museum’s largest dinosaur skeletons under sculpted skylights that pour sun into the carved-out realm.
From there, visitors can pursue a chronological journey through natural history, “from the origins of the universe and the Big Bang to the challenges facing humanity today and in the future, including the growing climate change crisis,” or skip to their own areas of interest. The exhibition sequence is organized around a central courtyard and culminates in the largest gallery, which houses some of the rarest dinosaur specimens ever discovered.
Thumbnail image by Deed Studio
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