The Qatari National Museum by Jean Nouvel

On Tuesday, March 23, 2010, the project of the National Museum of the State of Qatar was publicly presented for the first time at the MoMA museum in New York. The museum, designed by French architect Jean Nouvel, is part of a development program aimed at moving Qatar to the center of cultural and social life not only for the Gulf region. In designing the new museum, Nouvel drew inspiration from the typology of Kārwānsarā, which is a Persian masonry shelter for caravans, where travelers with their animals and goods could safely spend the night and stock up on provisions for their journeys.
“One leaves the desert behind and returns, enriched by precious images that remain deeply engraved in memory. The National Museum of Qatar will speak of a culture that is a message of modernity, transformation, and beauty born in places where the desert meets the sea.”
To a certain extent, the formal design of interconnected disks is based on the shapes of desert roses. However, the arrangement of the circular elements is not entirely random. For static reasons, some of the disks are positioned vertically while others lie more or less horizontally. The circles, of varying diameters and degrees of curvature, are constructed as spoked wheels covered with concrete slabs with glass fibers. The gaps between the disks will be filled with glass facades.
The museum will feature 8,000 m² for permanent collections, 2,000 m² for temporary exhibitions, an auditorium with 220 seats, two cafés, a restaurant, and a gift shop. A research center with laboratories will be available for museum staff.