The Sainsbury Wing’s co-designer Denise Scott Brown says plans to remodel her award-winning entrance are tragically bad. Here, she explains why
in London has publicly hit back at plans to completely rebuild it, accusing the new designer of “making our building look like a circus clown”.
But Scott Brown is not happy. “She’s making our building look like a circus clown,” she said. “There are elements of tragedy – circus clowns are made up to look happy, but they’re not. This is a circus clown wearing a tutu.” Scott Brown, now aged 91, is used to fighting back when it comes to her design. Despite being one half of the 20th century’s most influential postmodernist architectural partnership, she has often been overlooked in favour of Venturi.
She had to fight her corner again when Venturi was awarded the Pritzker architecture prize in 1991. Scott Brown was excluded by the jury in spite of his request to recognise her as an equal partner. The Sainsbury Wing, which houses the Renaissance collection, has a facade that was intended to be a mannerist variation on the theme of the main building, designed by William Wilkins in 1832. From the street entrance, visitors enter a dark, dense, low-ceilinged room intended to feel like the crypt of an Italian church with the weight of the building above. From there, they can ascend a broad staircase towards the light, airy galleries.
The doors have become the de facto entrance to the whole gallery for about 15,000 visitors a day, because the grand portico of the main 1832 Wilkins building in the centre of Trafalgar Square has no wheelchair access. Under the new designs, part of the first floor would be removed to turn the dim, intimate entrance hall into a grander, sunlit atrium.
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