This afternoon, the official ceremony for the groundbreaking Art Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen marked the beginning of construction for Rotterdam's newest cultural landmark art collection building. 

The public Art Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen is a new building typology that will be realised on the northern edge of Rotterdam's Museumpark, the heart of the city’s cultural campus. This new addition to the existing museum will become a new cultural landmark for Rotterdam, alongside world-class institutions that are already in the area including Kunsthal, Het Nieuwe Instituut, Chabot Museum and Sonneveld House. Residents, art lovers and visitors to the city will experience the museum’s collection in a specially commissioned atrium and exhibition spaces that allow 90% of the building to be public including artworks in storage. It is also intended that collection display changes bi-annual based on themes.

MVRDV’s competition-winning design for the 15,000m2 art depot will store the esteemed collection of more than 145,000 art and design objects that was amassed from 1849 till the present combined with restoration facilities, exhibition spaces, offices, logistics, a bar, restaurant, public roof terrace, and private collectors facilities. It will also have spaces not accessible to the general public that are for logistics, quarantine and rooms for private art collections whose owners can visit their art and even enjoy it in private spaces. This is a new commercial service offered by the museum and additionally, depots and an exhibition space run by the philanthropic foundation, De Verre Bergen will also be located in the Collection Building.

The official ceremony was attended by Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam City Council, De Verre Bergen Foundation, MVRDV, IMD structural engineers, RHDHV consultants, Peutz Building Physics, ABT Facade Engineers, BAM Construction and Engineering and other stakeholders.

Visit the collection's official website here