The Zhejiang Museum of Natural History is the centerpiece of a new cultural area near Dipuzhen in eastern China, an area renowned for its extensive bamboo forests. The new museum is set on a sloping site in a large natural park overlooking rice fields in the valley below.

From a cultural and museological point of view, the museum operates in a similar way to the practice’s previous design for Liangzhu Museum, with single black box exhibition interiors offering adaptability for an undetermined collection including objects of varying scale. The emphasis is therefore placed on the building and its relationship to the landscape. A composition of eight single-story pavilions stepping down the hillside frame an open space conceived as a central garden. In total they respond to a twelve-meter difference in height between the northern and southern boundaries of the site. Their rectangular forms are set at right angles to the slope. A loggia, or covered walkway, reminiscent of classical cloisters, mediates between the central garden and the exhibition pavilions, between inside and outside. Green roofs spill over the edges of the building, reinforcing the relationship between the museum and landscape.