MuSeu

Eindhoven University of Technology, Department of Architecture, Building and Planning, Eindhoven

Project idea

MuSeu is a transformation project of the former industrial site ‘Fabrica do Tecidos Labor’, in Mooca, Sao Paulo, Brazil. MuSeu has also been a truly personal research into a design approach deeply connected with the cultural identity of the country and its tensed and vibrating social context.
Everything started by asking myself the following questions:
What if it is possible to trigger through cultural transformations the development of the context? What if the condition of ‘developing context’ changes because and by the cultural transformation designed?
Lead by my ‘irrational call’, Brazilian culture and Sao Paulo were the perfect choice to explore my topic.
Brazil is a country where a strong passion leads everything: flavors, tastes, colors, rhythm and sounds, violence, art images and Sao Paulo is the economic pole and first richest and largest city of the country and because of that, the tension between these contrasting realities is even more accentuated. The topic of tension and contrast lead the entire process but the sensorial character of the culture becomes the entire subject of the project.
Secondly, I wanted to create a cultural center able to trigger development, so a place where the transformation is able to lead the development of the surroundings. Also, create a space where the people can feel to belong to it.
The urban context itself and its history suggested me to use the means of the street ‘as a public space of experience’ to transform the site, by cutting through the widely spread complex (about 20’000sq) and make of the street the main public space where to spend time and not only pass by.
This project propose itself as a new approach to the term ‘cultural identity place’, which nowadays, in architecture, is often related to a complex which includes a library and/or a museum, a theater and similar functions. I believe, metropolis like Sao Paulo deserves some identity spaces for local residents without investing energy, time and money only towards touristic attractions, but using their identity as a value to eventually put tourist in contact with it. This is what I have been looking for during the entire design process, a new consideration of a cultural center as a space of the city and for the city, which is nothing different to say, a space of the residents and for the residents.

Project description

MuSeu is the graduation studio design of the transformed site ‘Fabrica do Tecidos Labor’, in Mooca, Sao Paulo, Brazil. In order to explain the project is relevant to understand the overall atmosphere which leads the design. The sensorial culture of the country has been striking since the initial phase of the research and the need of a local character of the project is successfully achieved through its ‘open program’. The dualism between Formal and Informal art underlined by both the research and mapping exercise has been translated into the building complex, which, thanks to its own peculiar configuration, has allowed to further develop the design around the topic. MuSeu is composed by two main areas:

The Oficina Sensorial
The Museum Sensorial

The first one is enclosed by the latter and it hosts five diverse workshops developed according each sense. Every space has a diverse configuration in relation to its possible use and the sense it refers to, but it is important to mention that the spaces are designed as ‘Elements’, in order to be flexible for different uses. The translation of the five senses (Sight, Hearing, Smell, Taste and Touch) into design tools has been developed carefully in order to derive from their features, the architecture tools used to design the sensorial workshops. The sequence of the Museum Sensorial is guided by the artistic flooring, since the complete permeability of the spaces. The internal street, considered as the experience place of the Oficina Sensorial, where the activities of the workshops can be expressed and interfere with the public, is a cut throughout the entire complex. The street represents the ‘public open space’ of the complex: not only a space where to pass by, not only merely a connection between the Rua da Mooca and the Avenue Alcantara Machado, but it becomes the public space of experience of MuSeu, of its vibe and activities and most importantly, it is open to public events. The flux through the complex is studied in order to have a gradual difference between private and public space. While the museum is hosted in the restored old buildings of the Fabrica, the sensorial workshop is design applying a radical transformation to the inner core of the complex, resulting therefore with the Informal environment of the workshops surrounded by the Formal environment of the museum, which blends is the surrounding. The Sensorial Workshops are accessible only from the locals, who have the opportunity to exhibit their arts and crafts in the Formal environment of the Museum. The street, is the place where public visitors, locals and tourists meet.

The name
The term ‘Seu’ , in Portuguese, means ‘Yours’ which is coherent with the choice of a design where local people can express themselves. Moreover, according the Oficina area, the word ‘Seu’ can be decomposed as:

s-sensorial
e-espacio
u-usar

Thus, ‘a sensorial espacio da usar’. Finally the need of represents the Museum side in the name of the complex, led my choice to the complete name, all in Portuguese language, Mu – Seu. The ‘obliged’ interrelation between visitors as users and its flexible use will keep the project alive throughout the years, in order to become the new pumping heart of Mooca.

Technical information

The complex of the Fabrica do Tecidos Labor is extended for about 20,000 sq, representing therefore and widely spread architecture-size complex. The design has been represented in different scale drawings and renders in order to create a complete overview of the project.
Drawings
Masterplan 1_500
Ground floor plan 1_200
Two transversal sections 1_200
One longitudinal section 1_200
Three elevation drawings 1_200
Two technical details 1_5
One axonometric detail of a movable shading system
Ten renders which lead yourself through the complex.
Four renders of interesting insights, to complete the overview
Book
Extensive report of the design process
Maquettes
Transversal section model 1_200
Concept model of the program
Concept model 1_100 of the five senses translated into design tools
Contextual model of the complex and surroundings 1_500

Co-authors

Individual project.