In brief
A showcase for experimental architecture, the Serpentine’s Summer Pavilion is a unique exhibition programme. The first one was designed by Zaha Hadid in 2000, followed by Daniel Libeskind, Toyo Ito and Oscar Niemeyer in 2003. The design for the 2004 pavilion by MVRDV was never completed, due to its formal audacity. But from 2005 onwards a new design has been erected each summer on the lawn next to the Serpentine Gallery.
Ambitious formal explorations were seen as the driving idea of the pavilion designs at the start, supported by the creative thinking of leading structural engineer Cecil Balmond. In recent years the emphasis has been increasingly focused on ecological thinking, locally sourced materials and easily transportable forms. The 2024 pavilion by Minsuk Cho exemplifies this trend.
As Hans Ulrich Obrist, the artistic director of Serpentine Galleries, has pointed out, the exhibition programme follows the tradition of temporary pavilions in architectural innovation. The Barcelona Pavilion by Mies van der Rohe (1929) and the Finnish Pavilion by Alvar Aalto for the World Fair in Paris (1937), or the Philips Pavilion by Le Corbusier and Iannis Xenakis for the World Fair in Brussels (1958) are benchmarks in 20th century architectural history. Ideas in global architectural design circulate today in the metaverse, but it’s always such a delight to experience the spaces in real life.