The 9,000 m2 House of Music is nestled amongst the trees inside Budapest’s City Park. Sou Fujimoto wanted to design the museum as a continuation of the park.
A large undulating canopy, made out of 1,000 honeycomb-shaped elements, aims to blur the boundaries between museum and park. The canopy is covered with 30,000 decorative tree leaves and punctured with 100 crater-like holes. Some are punctured by trees and others allow for natural light to flood the interiors.
“We were enchanted by the multitude of trees in the City Park and inspired by the space created by them. Whilst the thick and rich canopy covers and protects its surroundings, it also allows the sun’s rays to reach the ground. I envisaged the open floor plan, where boundaries between inside and outside blur, as a continuation of the natural environment.”
- Sou Fujimoto
The facade is glazed with 94 custom-manufactured panels that reach up to 12 meters in height. The curtain wall breaks with the typical closed box concert hall typology and creates a setting where concert visitors are set among the trees.
For the 320-seat concert hall, Sou Fujimoto collaborated with Nagata Acoustics to develop zigzag-shaped glazed walls that allow sound to reverberate and disperse in order to produce a homogeneous sound.
The museum is dedicated to the creation of music and sound. The program is divided across three levels. The subterranean level houses the permanent and temporary exhibitions, including a unique sound dome. The permanent exhibition will take visitors on a journey through the history of European music.
At the park level visitors can enter the two concert halls and an open-air stage. The largest of the two, the glass-walled concert hall, is equipped with a sinkable stage. The smaller multipurpose hall can function as a lecture room, workshop space, concert venue or auditorium.
The open-air stage, spectacularly covered by the undulating canopy, will host daytime and evening concert events.. Visitors can sit on the hillside tribune or observe from the adjacent garden terrace.
The top level is dedicated to education. The Multimedia Library and Club hold a large number of important written, audio, visual and film documentation on the history of Hungarian music. The House will offer music education, workshops for schools and groups of children, alongside an open university program of courses and short lectures.
