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but one that had sat unattended for a
half-century after it was inaugurated in
1968. An astonishment in need of repair,
the building would require a present-day
architect of great skill and some stature to
take on what would ultimately result in its
painstaking six-year refurbishment. That
extraordinary task fell to David Chipperfield
Architects Berlin office, whose namesake,
British architect David Chipperfield, was
recently anointed the 2023 Laureate of
the Pritzker Architecture Prize. Yet even
with an assured hand at the wheel, the
project—a tentpole of Mies' remarkable
career—remained of enormous gravity.
"Taking apart a building of such
unquestionable authority has been a
strange experience but a privilege,"
Chipperfield says of the project. "The
Neue Nationalgalerie is a touchstone for
myself and many other architects. Seeing
behind its exterior has revealed both its
genius and its flaws, but overall it has only
deepened my admiration for Mies' vision.
Our work was therefore surgical in nature,
addressing technical issues to protect this
vision. Certainly carrying out such a task
in a building that leaves no place to hide
is daunting, but we hope to have returned
this beloved patient seemingly untouched
except for it running more smoothly."
What, then, to do with building of profound
architectural importance that left almost no
room to maneuverer? For the Chipperfield
team, it was to accept the traces of age in
the structure, so long as they did not blight
the existing building fabric or compromise
its visual appearance, which was not
universally admired when the building
was in its infancy, but grew a devoted
following made up of modern architects
like Chipperfield.
Bringing the two-volume structure—a
glass box sitting atop a gallery space—
to current technical standards greatly
involved addressing the poor performing
glass box, which had accumulated 50
years' worth of condensation within.
But one does not simply tuck in a bit of
insulation here and there and correct the
problem. "You can't fit a credit card in
between Mies' details," as Chipperfield
