Redsquare Productions traveled to Aspen, Colorado, to walk through Shigeru Ban’s Aspen Art Museum and learn how the project came to fruition from an explorative collaboration between the Japanese architect and the museum’s director, Heidi Zuckerman. Completed in 2014, the museum is an homage to the architecture and picturesque landscapes of the Western USA as well as a vessel to reconnect with the invigorating nature of Aspen.
“We are interested in the idea of retreat and Aspen and the Aspen Art Museum as a place of retreat, a place of solace, a space of contemplation,” begins Heidi Zuckerman, the Nancy and Bob Magoon CEO and Director of the Aspen Art Museum. “We wanted to create a space to facilitate those opportunities for our visitors.” Take a walk through the building to experience the unique connections that Shigeru Ban builds between a contemporary art space and the mountainous state of Colorado.
“We didn’t want a building that could be done anywhere,” expresses Zuckerman. “We weren’t interested in a sculpture — we were interested in a building that had interest and integrity but also had proper art spaces.”
To integrate the Aspen Art Museum in the context of downtown Aspen — where the buildings are mostly square, cubical brown structures finished with brick or wood — Shigeru Ban became inspired to make a straightforward cubical architecture. Considering brick too heavy, he chose a lightweight material — a sort of paper laminated with resined timber — to create a woven pattern around a glass cube. Throughout the building, the translucent façade creates a unique in-between atmosphere so that from within the museum, the visitors still experience a connection to the outdoors and Aspen’s wild environment.
The woven screen wraps an extensive programming for the museum — so extensive in fact, that Shigeru Ban’s solution to maximize gallery space was to locate the museum’s lobby on the rooftop of the building. This gesture forces visitors to travel to the highest point of the building before making their descent through the body of the building, much like a skier does on a slope. The ascent is facilitated either by stairs, which are located in a semi-outdoor indoor space, or a glass elevator.
The analogy to the activity of skiing, which takes the individual up to a summit before heading down a slope, reveals the architect’s concern in making an appropriate experience for the setting of the museum, as the rooftop offers an exquisite view of the surrounding mountain range.
“For me, the roof is one of the most important elements of architecture,” explains Ban. “I thought that having a timber structure was very appropriate for Aspen. I wanted to create a very interesting roof so that the people could connect the natural material with the context.” The diagonal and horizontal elements of the roof structure are built with very simple connections, requiring no metal structures so that the roof retains a clean and lightweight aesthetic.
“One of the things that we were very attracted to about Shigeru’s work is its inherent modesty, and the humbleness of the materials was something very appropriate to Aspen,” concludes Zuckerman. “It was a real collaborative process. It was a process really based on respect and I really think that what he created for us was perfect.”
This video was produced by Redsquare Productions. See more of their video and photography work at www.redsq.us and explore Shigeru Ban’s portfolio on the architect’s profile.