MUDE Building reopening

The requalification project aimed to provide the building with the necessary functional requirements to allow the museum to fully function and, for this reason, it was developed in close coordination between design, museology, architecture and specialty projects. The MUDE building thus returns to being the cultural hub dedicated to all expressions of design, in the historic center of Lisbon, with areas for exhibition, creation, education, study, debate and leisure, meeting, conversation and sharing.

The Exhibitions galleries will occupy the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th floors in open spaces, without partitions or coverings, substantiating the concept of the exhibition as an “open work”, defended for MUDE since 2009. In each new exhibition, the interiors will be changed and experienced in different ways. Between floors 3 and 4, a visual connection was created in the octagon area. MUDE, in this place, will be experienced as a prismatic point of opening and convergence between the observer and the entire museum.

In this requalification of the building, the structural reinforcement solution that ensures its anti-seismic capacity stands out. This process enabled the valorization of pre-existing materials (in particular, brick, concrete and stone) and the different construction techniques applied over time in this location, contributing to the museological intention of transforming the building into a living testimony of design, architecture and engineering.

One of the new spaces to be opened to the public is the Design Library, expanded over the last 10 years, and which is part of the MUDE Documentation and Information Center. In terms of furniture, this space follows the general philosophy of privileging local natural raw materials and national production, reinterpreting models that reflect Portuguese know-how and material culture and, above all, guarantee an economy of means, resources and manufacturing techniques, avoiding excess and waste.