19/07/2020
Nubuke extended by Baerbel Mueller, Juergen Strohmayer, photography by Julien Lanoo.
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Nubuke Extended completes and reorients the Nubuke campus, making it into a cultural and civic hub in the expanding metropolitan area of Accra and connecting it to a growing network of cultural spaces in Ghana.
Existing structures on the grounds have been refurbished, relocated, or adapted to meet Nubuke ́s aims. The main bungalow, which up until now housed all functions in one building – exhibition spaces, offices, shops and storage – has been opened up, resulting in a creative co-working environment within a generous setting. Additional structures have been designed to create a multi-programmed environment that provides space and infrastructure for artists, cultural activists of diverse disciplines, and audiences of all generations. A new building hovers above the existing garden and frames a central green area, with Nubuke’s Indian almond tree at its center. It serves as a landmark that responds to both immediate and urban contexts. The massing strategy for Nubuke Extended is aimed at creating diverse spaces and spatial situations that are open for artists, curators, visitors, citizens, and children to engage with, while acting as a unifying character for the ensemble of buildings and landscapes on the campus.
The design of Nubuke Extended is rooted in the decision to maintain the 1980s bungalow and to develop a new structure ‘above’ the garden, as both the old building and garden have become emblematic of Nubuke as a space in the city. The design reorients Nubuke through a new structure that does not take away from but rather augments the existing qualities of outdoor green areas and frames unique landscape features, such as the centrally located Indian almond tree and an adjacent palm grove that has been incorporated into the garden.
The renovation of the Nubuke bungalow and additional structures, which were built and modified through many iterative design and building phases, has followed these principles of reorienting the grounds, augmenting existing qualities, and reuse. A shipping container has been shifted off of a concrete base that has become an outdoor stage housing a children’s library and bistro kitchen. An auxiliary building has been converted into a loft for Nubuke’s artist-in-residency program by simplifying the former floor plan and adding a bathroom and kitchenette. The bungalow, previously a labyrinthine collection of rooms, has been reorganized and opened up by extending all the exterior windows to the floor and creating views to the garden and interior courtyard.
Across the lawn, the new gallery building has been defined by cantilevered spans and slender supporting walls on the ground floor, which allow the garden to spread from the bungalow throughout the new structure, creating shaded space for activities and exhibitions to take place outdoors. The gallery volume, lifted from the ground, has been defined by a concave façade that bends to frame an urban-scale courtyard between the bungalow, the gallery, the property walls, and the palm grove, creating a center for the campus.
©nav_s baerbel mueller + Juergen Strohmayer + orthner orthner & associates (OOA)
@ East Legon, Accra-Ghana
