Welcome to MPavilion 2019 by Glenn Murcutt! First bird’s eye video and photos
The moment we’ve all been waiting for is here—MPavilion 2019 by Glenn Murcutt opens in the Queen Victoria Gardens this Thursday 14 November!
A landmark of Australian design, MPavilion 2019 is Glenn’s first civic city building, built in the fiftieth year of his sole practice and commissioned by the Naomi Milgrom Foundation. To celebrate and to give you a first look at Glenn’s serene and uniquely Australian MPavilion, we’re excited to show you this stunning bird’s-eye video by Radar Kane and images by renowned architecture photographer John Gollings.
MPavilion 2019 draws from Glenn’s storied career and looks to the future as a climate-responsive and environmentally responsible public design for the whole community. The design was also influenced by a picnic under the wing of a light aircraft on a trip Glenn took to Mexico thirty years ago, resulting in an expansive all-white structure with a fabric roof, touched down lightly in the gardens. The design brings to mind Glenn’s learned Indigenous knowledge to “Touch the earth lightly” with his architecture.
MPavilion 2019. Photo by John Gollings.
Naomi Milgrom AO, chair of the Naomi Milgrom Foundation, who commissioned Glenn Murcutt to design MPavilion 2019, said: “Glenn’s fifty-year practice has inspired a new movement in thinking about climate-responsive design. His MPavilion refines the Australian characteristics we’ve all come to love about his buildings, and provokes a conversation about how Australian design can lead a growing international conversation about the future of cities.”
MPavilion 2019. Photo by John Gollings.
Glenn said about his design: “I felt a crisp white building that at night could be lit from within its roof—like a lantern in the Queen Victoria Gardens, giving the pavilion a feeling of lightness—would sit comfortably in the location. Having the pavilion face north, open towards the river, I could work with good climatic conditions. This also means that from within the MPavilion one can view the gardens to the river and the city.”
MPavilion 2019. Photo by John Gollings.
MPavilion 2019 was brought to fruition by Glenn Murcutt AO with structural engineers AECOM, specialist tensile roof fabric advisor Temple Architecture, builders Kane Constructions, building surveyors Gardner Group, lighting designers Bluebottle in collaboration with JSB Lighting, and visual identity by Studio Ongarato.
MPavilion 2019. Photo by John Gollings.
The Naomi Milgrom Foundation also commissioned acclaimed Melbourne-based designer Chris Connell to create a stool for use during the 2019/20 season. The result is the ‘MP Stool’, a sleek and earth-red stool made locally in collaboration with Melbourne furniture design and manufacture practice grazia&co.
MPavilion 2019 opens in the Queen Victoria Gardens on 14 November 2019 – 22 March 2020. MPavilion is an initiative of the Naomi Milgrom Foundation in partnership with City of Melbourne, Victorian Government through Creative Victoria and Development Victoria, ANZ, and RACV.