Herzog & de Meuron to design a museum in southern Seoul

Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, world-renowned Swiss architects, have been appointed to design a new art museum in Seoul, Korea. It will be their first project in Korea.

Yoo Sang-Duck, the chairman of SongEun Art and Cultural Foundation, received the 25th Montblanc de la Culture Arts Patronage Award at SongEun ArtSpace located in southern Seoul. Yoo said in his acceptance speech that the foundation recently decided to appoint Herzog & de Meuron to lead the design of a new art museum on a 1600-square-meter site near the Cheongdam crossroad.

Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, who were childhood friends born in 1950, established an architectural firm in 1978. Herzog & de Meuron is best known for the Tate Modern Museum in London, the remodeled building of a former power station completed in 2000. The firm won the 2001 Pritzker Prize, the so-called Nobel Prize of architecture. In 2008, it designed “Bird’s Nest” national stadium for the Beijing Olympics in collaboration with China’s dissident artist Ai Weiwei.

“Although the details, including design concept and size, have yet to be discussed in the current site purchase process, the two architects accepted the offer after learning that the foundation has supported new artists,” said an official of SongEun Art and Cultural Foundation. The construction of the new museum is scheduled to start in 2017 and be completed in 2019. The total size is expected to be double that of 660-square-meter SongEun ArtSpace.

손택균기자 sohn@donga.com