Porsche museum - Steel Giant under the Hood

The basement, a ferro-concrete construction anchored firmly in the ground, stands for the experience and tradition of Porsche ..

A few years ago the Porsche museum, opened in 2009 in Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen at the corporation’s headquarters, would not have been able to be built the way it stands today. The bold construction brought planners and computer technology alike to the limits of what’s physically possible.
Delugan Meissl Associated Architects from Vienna had won the competition of the new Porsche museum in January 2005 with a pure architectural sculpture. The challenge the Principal had to face now was to develop a realizable building concept based on this fascinating sculpture. In plain language: fitting the bearing construction with its complex requirements into the given cubic content without reducing the wanted architectural effect. And finding specialists who were able to calculate a construction as complex as this. Furthermore, the time schedule was a tight one: Already in October 2005, only nine months after the competition had ended, construction works began on the 7,872 square meters premises. When the foundations were laid – combined pile-raft foundations- , the rest was still being planned.

The statics had to be constantly re-calculated, coordinated and adjusted with the numerous specialist planners. Up to 100 companies could be found at the building site during construction phase at one given point in time, a huzzle and buzzle that had to be coordinated to work out smoothly.
Two volumes determine the building: basement and showroom, also called “plane”. The basement, a ferro-concrete construction anchored firmly in the ground, stands for the experience and tradition of Porsche. Here, the functionalities common for a museum are concentrated around the central foyer. A peculiarity and heart of the museum is the classic workshop, only separated by a car shelf and glazing, where historic customer and museum vehicles are getting repaired.

The 160 meters long showroom body “floats” above the basis and conveys a sensuous perception of the Porsche universe, the company’s development. It towers above the “Porscheplatz” (Porsche square) up to 50 meters high providing space for 80 vehicles across 5,600 square meters. Trussed girders, consisting of 6,000 tons of steel, were needed for the construction – the competition documents had listed “only” 1,850 tons. The trussed girders are pooled as support grids and are a system stable within itself – similar to a box where all six sides have a stiffening functionality. With unbelievable effort the polygonal construction has been placed upon three cores, two of which are built as asymmetric Y-columns. Apart from that, the three cores house all supply and exhaust lines for the “plane”.
Basement and “plane” are connected through the non-bearing “pin”, letting visitors plunge into the introverted, nearly all white and homogenous showroom via the steep main stairs and the nearly 32 meters long escalator leading from the basis up to the upper sphere. A spiral with ramps, galleries and squares opening up space – the street was brought into the building, so to speak, and lead towards the top onto the roof terrace.

Many of you have probably already seen the Porsche museum – what were your impressions? Were you aware of the maximum performance in terms of planning and realization under the “hood”?

Constructor: Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche Aktiengesellschaft
Architect: Delugan Meissl Associated Architects
Completion: 2009
Size: GFA 25,800 m²