In February, the British Museum announced Lebanese firm Lina Ghotmeh Architecture as the winner of a competition to redesign its Western Range galleries. Dedicated to ancient Greece, Egypt, Rome, Assyria and the Middle East, with a collection spanning thousands of years, the group of buildings represent about a third of the museum's gallery space.
Led by the multi award-winning architect Lina Ghotmeh, the Paris-based LGA – behind projects such as Beirut’s Stone Garden, France’s Atelier Hermes in Normandy and the 2023 Serpentine Pavilion in London – was chosen for their winning concept by the jury of the more than 60 teams that applied for the chance to renovate the Western Range last year. The jury said the LGA proposal showed "a deep understanding and sensitivity towards the museum, the complexity of collections' display and artefacts’ interactions with diverse visitor groups."
The team also includes Lebanese artist Ali Cherri, whose contemporary works often merge with real ancient artefacts. They will be working alongside companies including Purcell, Arup – MEP, Holmes Studio, Wayfinding and Plan A.
“It’s a feeling of sharing, of collective joy and an expression of deep humanity that arises from the connections and emotions these moments evoke," Ghotmeh tells The National. "It’s both beautiful and soothing to see our efforts come to fruition and contribute to advancing our societies.
"It’s also a feeling of responsibility – the responsibility to bring our visions to life and continue this path of striving for quality and beauty."
Ghotmeh says she and her team are thrilled about the renovation, to see "the possibilities of what a 21st century museum could be".
“For me, each project is a historical, material and creative journey – like an archaeology of the future," she says. “It’s about finding ways to engage with it, creating dialogue and turning spaces into vessels. This is an opportunity to create an extraordinary place that inspires a deep connection with the world.”
Ghotmeh's archaeological approach to design is reflected in her vision for the new Western Range. The plan resembles a live dig, where some of the artefacts are displayed across an open courtyard in gravel-covered grid squares.
Sustainability and the use of natural materials are also major parts of her practice, echoed here in the pale beige stone making up most of the design. The colour palette of the space is all soft neutrals, working harmoniously with the light-filled space, but not distracting from the artefacts on display.
The original design – created by English architect Sir Robert Smirke in the 1820s in the then-popular Greek Revival style – was built to accommodate 100,000 visitors a year and house a collection of about 150,000 objects. Today, the museum welcomes more than six million people annually, and holds a staggering collection of more than eight million treasures.
With this in mind, Ghotmeh has been charged with creating an architectural transformation able to fully display the collection in new, visitor-centric ways, as well as make new spaces for collection stores and research centres.
The original Western Range consists of 10 separate buildings, added to the main museum over the past 190 years. They are therefore quite disjointed in design and style. Ghotmeh’s renovation will aesthetically unify them, create better flow and upgrade them for a modern museum experience, with interactive and digital elements that bring the objects to life.
“This competition has been an exciting process shaped by dialogue and multiple voices," Ghotmeh says. "I am looking forward to continuing this rich and collaborative process as we work towards transforming this section of the museum into an extraordinary space – a place of connections for the world and of the world.
"Our vision transforms the Western Range into a living museum – a place of dialogue and reinvention, where historic narratives intertwine with contemporary perspectives."
Ghotmeh and the team will now take their winning design further, working with the museum to create a final design approach, which is expected to be shared by mid-2026. Once the design has been finalised, the museum will work in stages to implement the transformation, without disrupting all access to one of the museum’s most renowned collections.
"This bold transformation renews the British Museum as a global meeting point of shared history where poetics and care foster peace and understanding," says Ghotmeh.
