The Polish Army Museum, by WXCA architects and with engineering by Buro Happold, is now open in Warsaw. Situated at the historic Warsaw Citadel, the museum project combines historic buildings and new construction for a contemporary public.
The museum site occupies 32 hectares of the Warsaw Citadel, a hilltop fortress built in the 1830s by the army of the Russian Empire. The Polish military has used the Citadel and as such, it has been a restricted area, until now……
WXCA’s design for the Polish Army Museum includes the now-completed South Building, a second building that will be constructed later on the northern side of Gwardii Pieszej Koronnej Square, and several listed buildings subject to refurbishment.
The South Building comprises eight blocks united by a common green roof that speaks to the surrounding park and natural environment. With a total built area of more than 12,000 square meters, the building offers flexible space for temporary exhibitions and events and the museum’s sizable permanent collection of Polish arms.
The museum is constructed with coloured, cast-in-place architectural concrete that visually blends with the existing Citadel architecture. The monumental scale of the building is softened with a façade that features a bespoke formwork pattern of chevrons that military decoration, reflecting the site’s history over two centuries and continuing the close relationship with the military. The size of the individual ornamental modules is based on the scale of the human being, the hand specifically. The pattern repeats on the walls of the galleries and throughout the interior spaces.
Behind the seemingly simple orthogonal volume of the South Building is a complex technical infrastructure, the technical requirements of which were carefully integrated into the design thanks to a close collaboration between WCXA and Buro Happold.
Mechanical, electrical, and plumbing functions are cast into the main walls, while the concrete ceiling and roof provide a thermal mass that regulates the indoor temperature. A low-energy system of year-round heating and cooling is provided via a ground exchanger, comprising 91 vertical boreholes drilled to a depth of 150 meters, that works in combination with heat pumps.
Buro Happold also designed a new entrance tunnel, allowing access from the Vistula riverside to the embankment at the Citadel’s base. A post-tensioning structural system minimizes the amount of concrete required for the tunnel. A new entrance and recently designed footbridge further aid in circulation, intensifying the connections within the Citadel and creating new links between the Citadel and the city.
