Design that rocks
An extraterrestrial encampment on a lunar landscape? No, something literally much more down to earth. Innovative architecture inspired by its site puts a museum in touch with its subject—geology.
By Catherine Mazy
The giant steel sea urchins nestle on what was, 65 million years ago, the sea floor. Today, the site couldn’t be more the opposite: the desert of the Al Madam Plain, about 48 kilometres from the city of Sharjah. The six “sea urchins”, ranging from 16 to 22 metres in diameter, house the new Buhais Geology Park Interpretive Centre. The park, which opened in January, is dedicated to research and education about the geological and archaeological riches of the area. The buildings’ urchin architecture was inspired by fossils at the site.
The design using a cluster of pods, rather than a conventional rectangular building, allowed the architects to create a project with minimal environ- mental impact.
“We thought long and hard about how to set these objects into the landscape, how you build in this location,” says Simon Fraser, principal with London-based Hopkins Architects. “Do you dig into the earth or set it above the earth?”
The answer was above. To minimise the environmental impact and avoid digging large foundations, the pods rest on reinforced concrete foundation disks, seeming to hover above the former seabed. “Everything is prefabricated and modular, made offsite, to have less time onsite for contractors,” he says.
“We thought long and hard about how to set these objects into the landscape, how you build this location.”
The pods, in the shadow of Jebel Buhais, lie in a wadi that fills with water during rains. While rare, the rains are torrential when they do occur. “It was another reason to lift the buildings off the ground,” Fraser says.
Jebel Buhais is part of a long limestone ridge with Sharjah’s landmark Fossil Rock at the other end. “In fact, the fossils go all the way through the ridge,” says Peter Jackson, architect advisor to HH the Ruler’s Office. His role in the project was to ensure “we get really good architecture that’s sensitive to the site, that reinforces the sense of place, that feels right and doesn’t jar with the environment.
“What Hopkins and Simon gave us was just that—a very unique take on how to create an exciting facility for school children, university students, the general public and tourists, to get them excited about geology,” he says.
The site was chosen in part for the dramatic cliffside that towers above, its face seeming to drip like candle wax, Jackson says. “In the exposed cliff face, you can see different levels of the sea bed over millennia,” he explains. Long ago, a huge piece of limestone broke off and fell into the wadi bed, where rains washed away the bottom, so it looks like a cubic mushroom with a stem, with many fossils exposed.
The cafe terrace (above) offers panoramic views of Jebel Buhais. Below, a ceiling detail. Top photo by Marc Goodwin. Bottom by Tim Sheridan.
“It was an exciting project because the museum is actually the place,” Jackson says. “You’re looking at a site with an interpretive centre, rather than, in a city, an exhibition within a box. There’s a good geology section in the Natural History Museum, but that’s a completely different experience.”
The experience starts at visitors’ arrival at an administrative and reception building. They then walk or take an electric buggy up the path, to get the feel of going back in time.
The interlinked pods consist of two exhibition spaces, a café and terrace, and a service building. A theatre breaks with the pods’ circular theme on the outside, its flat face of windows offering a panorama of the cliffside. But inside, the screen closes off the view in a circle around the seats to give spectators an immersive experience. Sharjah’s Environment and Protected Areas Authority, which operates the Buhais Geology Park, intends to offer evening light shows on the magnificent cliff face, says Hana Al Suwaidi, Chairperson of EPAA.
The pod design offers several advantages. First, each pod is made of a prefabricated concrete shell. Then concrete ribs are bolted on, almost like petals on a flower. The concrete offers passive energy efficiency by increasing the thermal mass in the space, Fraser explains. The concrete cools at night, minimising the need for air conditioning.
The concrete is covered by steel panels in the same reddish-brown, bronze tones of the surrounding desert. “The client wanted something clean-looking, so we used galvanised [no-rust] steel sheets with a metal paint with a slight metallic finish,” Fraser says. “It reflects the sun and the heat.”
The panels shade the pods. In the space between the steel and concrete layers, air circulates upward and out through vents, allowing heat to escape. The areas with windows look east towards Jebel Buhais, which casts shade in the morning. That means the large windows of the theatre aren’t in the sun.
“It was an exciting project because the museum is actually the place. You're looking at a site with an interpretive centre, rather than, in a city, an exhibition within a box.”
The exhibitions are geared towards students, who can touch and examine specimens. Jebel Buhais is the main attraction, featured in views from the interpretive centre. Top photo by Joanne Yu. Bottom by Marc Goodwin.
The top of each pod is an oculus, or circular window, to let in natural light that’s reflected to the pods’ ceilings. Even the furniture and exhibits, custom made by local artisans, echo the circular theme. Besides metal tables and seats, there are locally crafted leather cushions that can be shifted around to accommodate different kinds of groups. “They’re like soft rocks,” Fraser says. Outside, at the end of the entrance ramp, three circular canopies shade visitors waiting for a buggy back to the car park.
Because the museum is the entire site, there’s a trail leading up and around Jebel Buhais, which rises about 100 metres. “It’s lovely to walk around the site in winter,” Jackson says. “Even in summer, because it’s in the middle of the peninsula, the climate is drier, without humidity.” While planners considered installing shade along the trail, they decided it would be too intrusive and would impact the environment.
At the trail’s apex, a canopy shades an open-air classroom. The educational component was every bit as important to the project as tourism and research, Ms. Al Suwaidi says. “The experience is totally different when compared to other learning centres. Most of the teachers like to teach in the open-air education room. It gives the students something more than they have in school. They can touch the fossils.”
Along the park’s path, not far from the interpretive centre, another canopy protects Bronze Age tombs, about 3.5 million years old, whose shape resembles the word Allah in Arabic script. The tombs have stone walls with a series of five chambers that would have had corbeled roofs. “You can see the original entrance and the beginnings of the corbeling,” Jackson says. “It’s a big tomb.”
The interpretive centre’s design proves that “you don’t need to go over the top to make good architecture,” Jackson says. Hopkins Architects “got the colours right, the textures right, the shapes right. It’s a wonderful piece of architecture.”
Top opening photo by Marc Goodwin
