Winning an invited competition for the design and execution of the stand for the Ma'agan Michael ancient ship, in the hall dedicated for it which was also designed by our group.
Steel laser cut beams, steel bars along the planks and special adjustment members.
Hecht Museum, Haifa University, Israel, 2008.
the external steel beams follow the Rhythm of the ships' beams
The original silhouette of the ship is outlined by a steel rod
Photograph by Itamar Grinberg
View from gallery
Photograph by Itamar Grinberg
View from entrance
Competition entry original design, plan
Competition entry original design, elevation
Aiming at minimizing the obscuring of the find, the initial idea was to take advantage of the spatial curvature of the shell, originally optimized to stand the water pressure directed inwards, in a reversed manner; i.e., to lay a thin mesh of steel rods that would essentially bear exclusively tensile forces, not unlike Gaudi's experiment in Sagrada Familia. Furthermore, the spatial character of the mesh would render it overall strength and durability against local deviations of forces, like a Charles Eams' mesh chair, to invoke another historical Precedent. This thin mesh was to be set some 10 cm off the ship's body by special adjustable members.
However, the museum team preferred, for its good reasons, to resort to more familiar terrain, and thus the structural principle of the final design was more in line with that of the temporary wooden scaffoldings which served to hold the preliminary reconstruction.
Competion entry original design, partial elevation
Competion entry original design, adjustment member