The Glass Ark. Renzo Piano’s California Academy of Sciences
Renzo Piano’s new green museum, the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco is almost finished. Located in famous Golden Gate Park, and housing an aquarium, planetarium, and natural-history museum under two “hills” which are really a two-and-a-half-acre “living roof”, the building looks like a part of the park from some views.
As Piano says: “The building had to be green and sustainable to go with its purpose—study of the earth and science. It is also in a very unusual place, the middle of one of the most beautiful parks in the world. You almost never get a chance to build something in the middle of a great park, so it needed to be transparent. You needed to see where you are. Normally, a museum of natural science is created like a theater, so that you can have the exhibits inside. All museums normally are opaque; they are closed, like a kingdom of darkness, and you are trapped inside. But here you need to know about the connection with nature, so almost anywhere you are in this building you can see through to the outside.”
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Ilari Valbonesi @ July 15, 2008