MemHo

The Montreal Holocaust Museum project is a presence in the city. Its volume blends into the street grid and stands out for the austerity of its texture. This urban attitude creates an introverted museum experience and marks the weight of a memory.

Shoah museums bear a heavy testimony, and each in its own way attempts to offer the sensory support of a narrative. The MemHo works with the inertia and mass of the material as an architectural counterpart to the notion of memory, encouraging slowness and contemplation.

The museum experience is a completely introverted one, and its relationship with the city is a direct illustration of this. The threshold to the city, marked by a hollow, creates a break in the ground. The arrival in the monumental volume of the agora, coupled with the use of light, marks the passage into a world apart, oriented towards the garden.

The garden is one of the museum's centerpieces. Its abundance of vegetation contrasts with the mass of the building and the weight of the materials. It is the real horizon of the museum tour, which winds around it like a ribbon. The permanent exhibition gallery is an ascending path that starts at the lower level of the agora and joins it at the top.

CREDITS

Lead architect: Clément Blanchet Architecture
Client: Montreal Holocaust Museum
Nature of the operation: Competition
Realised in: 2022
Site: Montreal, Canada
Program: Museum
Budget: N/A

TEAM COMPOSITION

Architects: Alfonso Femia, CLCa_ Diana Cardas