Location: Melbourne, Australia.
Architect: OMA.
The Naomi Milgrom Foundation commissions a temporary pavilion each year from a leading international architect to encourage design debate and cultural exchange. The MPavilion in the Queen Victoria Gardens becomes a design and cultural laboratory from October through February, and is home to a series of talks, workshops, performances, and installations. The brief aims to create an architectural space and container of ideas incorporating the highest level of design thinking, innovation, experimentation, and engagement for Melbourne. The MPavilion design must act as a centerpiece for a free public program of cultural events and activities, stimulate tourism and visitation to Melbourne, and promote Melbourne as a design capital through meaningful collaborations. The brief asks for the design of a temporary and permanent pavilion. After its initial season, the pavilion is gifted to the people of Melbourne and relocated to a permanent site, creating a legacy of architectural gems for Melbourne, attracting greater tourism as the project evolves, and engendering community interest in design. MPavilion 2017, designed by Rem Koolhaas and David Gianotten of OMA, was donated by the foundation to Monash University. It will continue to be a dynamic incubator, where ideas about architecture and creativity will be encouraged and nurtured and will carry on inspiring young practitioners. MPavilion is a public venue on an intimate scale encouraging local and international dialogue. Visitors to the building are estimated at 500-800 per day, and the pavilion must be accessible to all with free entry and disabled access. Designed as a relocatable structure able to accommodate events with approximately 200-500 people, it must have weather protection, shade, and offer a café facility and lighting. MPavilion creates a space that can adapt to hold exhibitions, performances, workshops, and classes. Due to popular demand, MPavilion 2017 was extended. It presented 70 talks and public lectures, 63 music performances, 35 design meetings and gatherings, 26 workshops, 20 kids events, 25 health and wellbeing events, 7 projects and installations, and 250+ morning and evening rituals. It welcomed more than 117,000 visitors, a total of 477 free events over 133 days. The MPavilion design by Rem Koolhaas and David Gianotten of OMA addressed ideas at the forefront of international contemporary culture, responding directly to the Australian environment and context. MPavilion offers a newly commissioned, world-class, innovative architectural environment for a broad and diverse
Photo credit: John Gollings, Timothy Burgess, Laurence Bolhaar (of OMA), Bec Capp (of MPavilion).