SANAA wins new Budapest National Gallery competition over Snøhetta

Pritzker prize-laureate architectural firm SANAA – Sejima and Nishizawa and Associates is the winner of the commission to design the New National Gallery – Ludwig Museum in Budapest.

On April 14, 2015, the organizer of the architectural competition for the design of the New National Gallery in the capital city of Hungary announced that two projects were judged of equal value and (for the time being) shared the win.
They were the proposals by the Japanese Pritzker prize-laureate practice SANAA and by Norwegian one Snøhetta, the 2009 Mies Van Der Rohe Award-winner.

Now, after a long jury process, further reasoning, and a competitive meeting with the architects “based on professional and financial considerations”, Városliget Zrt. – the competition organizer – announced on November 26, 2015, that it would be the Japanese firm to design the new venue of the museum.

In a public report, the organizer stated: “In the months that followed the announcement of the result – in accordance with regulations and public procurement legislation – several rounds of negotiations were conducted between the architecture studios and Városliget Zrt., during which the announcer considered the contractual conditions, the quality of co-operation with the Hungarian party, the technical content, scheduling and costs relating to the respective designs, as well as the economy of the planned buildings. Based on the negotiations and the submitted proposals SANAA won the commission”

Above image: the winning design by SANAA.
Below you can see a quick comparison between the two finalists.
top:  Snøhetta’s project, © Architect: Snøhetta AS – Images: tmrw.se
bottom:  SANAA’s project, images courtesy of Liget Budapest

Nine teams submitted a valid design:

– David Chipperfield Architects
– Mecanoo
– Sejima and Nishizawa and Associates
– Snohetta
– gmp International GmbH Architects and Engineers, Leonhardt, Andrae und Partner Beratende Ingenieure VBI AG, ZWP Ingenieur-AG, bogner.cc KG
– Henning Larsen Architects, Arup Engineering, Gallagher and Associates, Transsolar – Energietechnik GmbH, MAN MADE LAND Bohne Lundqvist Mellier GbRand
– Davis Brody Bond Architects and Planners, Földes Architects, Buro Happold Engineering, Ken Smith Landscape Architect.
– Mihály Balázs Architect Studio and the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Technology and Economics
–  Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos S.L.P.

The last two equally shared the second prize. The overall prize amount of the competition for the New National Gallery – Ludwig Museum is 380,000 euros.

Below, two further images from the proposal by Snøhetta (© Architect: Snøhetta AS – Images: tmrw.se )