Museum for Argo, Volos, Greece

competition, 3rd prize

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Kostas Manolidis, Evaggelia Apostolou, 2014

(assistant: Konstantinos Kontokostas)

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The Museum for Argo is conceived as a vigorous place where the city of Volos will contemplate its furthermost past and will incorporate its legacy in the city’s current identity. The building reinforces the narrative of the ancient myth and evokes the proper sense of amazement. The robust and upright form of the building envelopes an inner universe where the visitor undistracted can surrender to the voice of the exhibits. Critical architectural attributes are the gradual process toward a dark center and the dramatic succession of narrow and extended spaces. 

A wooden structure incorporates the image of ship’s hull as a formal memory on the facade of the building and as a tuning of architecture with the shipbuilding in the interior.   The ancient and modern shipbuilding traditions along with the Argonautic expedition are the two themes that constitute the museological structure supporting the central exhibit of the modern Argo ship.