Fresh Builds: 15 Awesome Museums You Need To See

Image via Complex Original

Ordos Art & City Museum

Location: Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China

Architect: MAD Architects

Year Completed: 2011

This amorphous structure was built on what used to be part of an empty portion of the Gobi desert, in the new city center of Ordos. It features a windowless metal facade, with skylights that allow for natural light to blend borders between the structure and its surroundings.

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Crystal Bridges Museum

Location: Bentonville, Arkansas

Architect: Safdie Architects

Year Completed: 2011

The Crystal Bridges Museum consists of two suspended cable-and-wood buildings located in a ravine. The buildings, made from materials derived from the region—wood, fieldstone and limestone aggreage, create two ponds and act as dams as well as bridges.

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Titanic Belfast

Location: Belfast, Northern Ireland

Architect: Todd Architects (Lead Consultant/Architect), CivicArts (Concept Design Architects)

Year Completed: 2012

Titanic Belfast is the world's largest Titanic-themed exhibition. Built as part of Northern Ireland's largest tourism project, its galleries tell everything from who was aboard the ship to how it was built.

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Natural History Museum of Utah

Location: Salt Lake City, Utah

Architect: Ennead Architects

Year Completed: 2011

The Natural History Museum of Utah aims to bring humans closer to nature through science, education, and culture. The building transforms the shapes of its surrounding land, while its materials are inspired by the region's natural landscape of rock, soil, minerals, and vegetation.

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Clyfford Still Museum

Location: Denver, Colorado

Architect: Allied Works Architecture

Year Completed: 2011

The Clyfford Still Museum embraces nature amidst the urban context of Denver, Co. The museum facade, consisting of random patterns of vertical lines of concrete, becomes visible as you walk through a grove of trees. The Denver sunlight allows for the building's surface to change its look throughout the day.

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Lanyang Museum

Location: Yilan County, Taiwan

Architect: Kris Yao - Artech Architects

Year Completed: 2010

The granite rock-themed Lanyang Museum aims to show the culture and landscape of its city. Located next to a once prosperous, but now unused harbor, the museum reflects Lanyang's maritime history. An outdoor exhibition introduces the area's wetland ecology.

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The National World War II Museum

Location: New Orleans, Louisiana

Architect: Voorsanger Architects PC

Year Completed: Ongoing

The National World War II Museum is located in New Orleans, where a key landing craft used in the great war was built. The museum will feature multiple interpretive and interactive exhibits, and will be completed throughout a series of phases in future years. Currently Phase I has been completed and includes the 4-D theater, performance hall, executive office, retail, and restaurant spaces.

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The Barnes Foundation

Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Architect: Tod Williams and Billie Tsien

Year Completed: 2012

The new Barnes Foundation building, which opened in May 2012, not only includes multiple galleries but also a garden and classrooms. The structure is eco-friendly, built using recycled and reclaimed materials, and equipped with a landscape irrigation system that collects and reuses rainwater.

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Maritime Xperiential Museum

Location: Singapore

Architect: Michael Graves & Associates

Year Completed: 2012

The Maritime Xperiential Museum is located next to the water...fitting, since its exhibitions are also related to the water. Focusing on the maritime Silk Route, of which Singapore was an important part, the museum's design is inspired by the sea vessels that propelled the silk industry.

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Enzo Ferrari Museum

Location: Modena, Italy

Architect: Jan Kaplický

Year Completed: 2012

Ferrari's hometown, Modena, Italy, initiated this project to honor the city's most celebrated resident. A vaulted metal spaceframe and glass surfaces form the structure, making the building technically advanced and also reminding us of Enzo Ferrari's cars. Following the original architect Kaplický’s death in early 2009, Andrea Morgante of Shiro Studio led the completion of the project.

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Mecenat Art Museum

Location: Hiroshima, Japan

Architect: naf architect & design

Year Completed: 2010

This privately funded and owned museum is dedicated to exhibiting the works of a single artist, Kakudo Goami. To highlight Goami's work, the museum building makes use of natural light and wind, while the overall shape draws from concepts of origami—folding a single sheet of paper to create multiple layers and corners.

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National Maritime Museum

Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Architect(s): Dok Architecten: Liesbeth van der Pol, Jan Jaap Roeten, Sonja Müller, Ellen Wolse, Christina Patz, Mirthe Kooy, Ieke Koning

Year Completed: 2011

The Maritime Warehouse in Amsterdam has been renovated to make better use of its inner courtyard area and host cultural events throughout the year. The courtyard is covered by a full glass ceiling with geometric shapes, and serves as the central area around which to base museum navigation.

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Sogn & Fjordane Art Museum

Location: Førde, Norway

Architect: C.F. Møller Architects

Year Completed: 2012

Located in a small Norwegian town surrounded by mountains and near Jostedalsbreen, the largest glacier on the European mainland, the Sogn & Fjordane Art Museum is a contemporary addition to the town's visual scheme—geometric shapes and illuminated lines gives the structure a glacial look to fit right in amongst the landscape.

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Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum

Location: Lansing, Michigan

Architect: Zaha Hadid

Year Completed: 2012

This museum is to open next month on the north campus at Michigan State University. The stainless steel exterior almost guarantees that this will be the best looking (or at least most noticeable) building on campus, given the surrounding Collegiate Gothic structures.

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Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland

Location: Cleveland, Ohio

Architect: Farshid Moussavi

Year Completed: 2012

The newly built home of the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland has four stories, six sides, and is covered with mirrors. Featuring a full atrium, the ceiling and walls of the structure are painted blue, giving the museum an extra flare.

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