London is not a place I necessarily think to go and seek architecture. I recall it as mostly banking bohemouths and churches from previous visits. Then I found the Tate Modern….
I wanted to take my design team on a tour somewhere to help set the stage for the exercise that would create Haida, the design for FirefoxOS 2.0. As luck would have it, I could not have made a better choice. In my slide deck I asked “Why the Tate Modern?”. My answer “History”. “Vision”.
The large open exhibition space, set aside by the smaller gallery spaces created a juxtaposition of scale. Looking into the expanse from above, one’s mind really took off at all the possibilities of expression.
Not to be missed is the view from the top. Herzog & de Meuron still stand true as one of my favorites.
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Update May 2019
Returning to London for the first time after initially writing this post, my perspective on London has really changed drastically (see British Museum post).
On this revisit to the Tate Modern, what caught my attention was the in-between spaces. The transitions between floors, stairwells, etc. I don’t find the gallery spaces to be that compelling compared to the throughways. It reminds me a great deal of the Main Library in Amsterdam.
Again the main, freaking enormous gallery space was empty which is a real shame. I hope next time there will be something installed! Its an amazing reuse of industrial space- something I appreciate a great deal simply due to the sheer scale at which these buildings were constructed and how they have endured.
Website: Tate Modern Museum website
Address: Tate Modern, Bankside, London SE1 9TG, United Kingdom
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