Museum of the Moving Image

Client: British Film Institute
Cost: £8m
Status: Completed 1989

This world famous museum (MOMI) was built under a fast-track 'design, manage and construct' contract and the timetable from first instruction to submission for detailed planning was twelve weeks. The funding came entirely from private donations, sufficient at commencement for a simply serviced shell covering 3716m2, but as nobody was quite sure how successful the fund-raising would be, the design had to have the flexibility to grow incrementally during the construction process. It eventually grew to encompass a fully air-conditioned building covering 5110m2 with an additional undercroft, a small experimental cinema, and a temporary exhibitions gallery.

Sandwiched as it was above a car park and below the southern approach road to Waterloo Bridge, the site presented similar problems to an 'air rights' structure. The challenge was that the approach road was a thin, sloping , pre-stressed-concrete structure to which nothing of any weight could be attached and to which no part could be denied access for future inspection. It was also found to leak, resonate with traffic noise and move seasonally by as much as 100mm.

That such a site could be used at all for a museum is a testament to the skill of all those involved.

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