The recent inauguration of the Antestreia [Preview] exhibition, which introduces the new premises of the MUDE – Museum of Design and Fashion/Francisco Capelo Collection, is worthy of some comments and also provides other grounds for reflection, which, I believe, are of interest to the universe of architecture and the city. The history of the collection is already more or less known, thanks to ten years of dissemination in the media: its origins at the initiative of a private collector; the agreement reached with the Ministry of Culture to house the Design Museum in the Belém Cultural Centre (CCB), with the option of a future donation of the collection (when Manuel Maria Carrilho was minister, in 1999); the successful negotiation for purchase by Lisbon City Council (in 2002-03, when Santana Lopes was mayor); the subsequent closure of the museum at the CCB and placement of the collection in storage, while a move to the former Verride palace in Alto de Santa Catarina was announced (in 2006; a conversion project by Alberto Caetano working with Manuel Reis); the cancellation of the Santa Catarina project (after a legal challenge to the palace purchase and António Costa’s victory in the interim council elections); and the revelation of the final home for the museum, included in the plans for the renewal of the pombaline Baixa district (2008).
     The museum’s recent opening has marked the end of a long period of practically total silence. On the one hand, after six years of being public property, the fashion collection will now gain in profile. On the other, particular focus is being placed on the intentions of the present city government for this part of the city at a time in which the election calendar seems to determine each initiative. For once, there would seem to be a concerted strategy to revigorate the centre of Lisbon, as opposed to a disparate group of interventions. The aim is to transform the zone into a hub of creativity that can give new civic meaning to the Baixa and also recover the attractiveness that has long since disappeared. To achieve this, amongst the other actions already announced, it would be imperative to have the Portuguese Design Centre, the ModaLisboa fashion shows, the Experimenta Design association and the Lisbon Architecture Triennial installed in the vicinity of the MUDE.
     The MUDE now occupies the former headquarters of the Banco Nacional Ultramarino (BNU). The building takes up a whole block and has a total of 14,000 sq.m floor space distributed over eight floors. It is just a few steps away from Praça do Comércio, one of the city most privileged locations. A witness of the golden age in which the BNU issued the currency for the Portuguese colonies (with the exception of Angola from the 1926 onwards), the building, has for some years now, been empty, waiting. What we find today in the block are sediments of the successive interventions – both internal and external – that document the history of the bank, the economic contexts that framed it and also the architectural culture of each period.
     Following the First World War, the Portuguese economy experienced a short period of affluence, during which the Baixa district became a hub of head office buildings for banks, insurers and trading companies. As part of this wave of conversions, the BNU headquarter building had its first remodelling project in 1918, by Tertuliano Lacerda Marques (1882-1942). He proposed a rather grandiloquent idiom, a reinvention of the palatial architecture of the 18th century. The project was, however, not carried out and, two years later, a new design by the same architect with a radically different aesthetic approach was approved. For the first time in the history of the Baixa, the standard pombaline façade was re-appreciated and systematically reinstated. The elevations were re-composed, replacing all elements that had been altered up to that point and all additions above the eaves were demolished. The interiors however, were completely demolished and converted to meet the needs of a modern office building. The spaces were now organised around a large octagonal plan atrium through the whole height of the building with surrounding galleries; the atrium was topped by a skylight. This option had already been chosen for the Banco Lisboa & Açores (Ventura Terra, 1905), and also the Grandella & C.ª department store (Alfredo d’Ascenção Machado, 1891).

  The post World War II period saw a new wave of remodelling in the Baixa that accentuated the unstoppable trend towards mono-functionality – with the housing and small shops being replaced by larger office blocks. It was only in this period that the BNU came to occupy the whole block, following a project of 1951-1967 by Luís Cristino da Silva (1896-1976). The fundamental structural elements of the Tertuliano intervention were maintained and the principle of the reinstatement of the façades was also respected. Cristino’s meticulously detailed and constructed work is most visible on the monumentalised entrance on Rua Augusta and the public service space on the ground floor with its large counter in different coloured marble. The central atrium was filled in on all floors and, in the space that had been the skylight over the atrium, a dining room for the bank administration was installed, the interior of which was designed by Daciano da Costa (1930-2005) in 1963-1964.
     Like so many other buildings in the city’s traditional financial district, the BNU building was soon to lose the function and meaning associated with it. The mergers in the banking sector and spatial competition due to urban expansion meant that its future was always postponed. In the hands of the new owners the interior of the building was demolished – an action that was interrupted by the then conservation body, IPPAR [Portuguese Heritage] – leaving the finishings of the Tertuliano project in full view.
     The designers of the current project for the installation of the MUDE collection, architects Ricardo Carvalho and Joana Vilhena – who worked in close collaboration with the museum director, Bárbara Coutinho – were particularly sensitive to the state of semi-demolition they encountered. They reduced the intervention to the minimum indispensable for showing the chosen pieces and committed to the use of materials that highlight the ephemeral nature of the operations (wooden pallets as bases, tables made of cork chipboard, construction site tarpaulins as backdrops). They also took full advantage of the seductive image of the interrupted ruin so as to accentuate the museological decontextualisation of the objects on show. The contrast with the architectural surroundings full of patina and history and accumulated tensions of successive uses and periods and designers intensifies the untouched, immaculate and wrinkles (lifeless?) appearance of the icons of international design and haute couture that are normally inaccessible to the normal museum visitor. Immediately we are reminded of the Palais de Tokyo, which was transformed into a Site de Création Contemporaine [Site of Contemporary Creation], an exposed ruin, by Lacaton and Vassal (2001). But also of the Church of São Domingos next to the nearby Rossio square which disquietingly displays its scars from the fire damage it suffered.
     The work of the Carvalho and Vilhena duo likewise reveals the restrictions imposed by the old office spaces when used as exhibition rooms. When the current preview exhibition ends, the building will be thoroughly remodelled to make it a permanent museum and will reopen in late 2010 (architect: Alberto Caetano). A Loja do Cidadão public service centre is planned for the ground floor. This mixture of functions will de-sacralise the idea of the museum, no doubt, and one can legitimately ask if the two functions are really compatible. Will the result be greater than the sum of the two parts? Will it be consistent, vital, mutually stimulating? Or merely a forced marriage of convenience? How will the restrictions of both institutions (in terms of functions and meaning) be reconciled with each other and with the architectural object chosen to house them? The whole process calls for reflection on the conversion and re-functionalisation of architecture for new programmes, the relationship these have with conservation, appreciation and the interpretation of memories and heritage and with the tensions and contradictions of the collective history (i.e., without whitewashing the past). Above all because it is a museum.
     It goes without saying that a collection does not a museum make. Likewise, a collector needs more than just taste to gain recognition for posterity. It is also true that a pre-existing building of note and an architect of renown are not enough to make an exemplary museum (there are countless examples that prove this, even in the recent past). The next steps in the process will be decisive if the Museum of Design is to become a reality.|