Rising conspicuously from a former industrial site in the town of Roskilde, Denmark, a new museum of pop and rock music exudes all the swagger and wanton glamour of the iconic front men and guitar legends it’s meant to celebrate. A collaboration between architecture firms MVRDV and COBE, Ragnarock boasts a studded gold façade and a dramatic cantilevered section that thrusts out over the entrance like an exaggerated marquee, greeting visitors (who approach via a red walkway) with all the subtlety of an ’80s hair-band anthem. MVRDV principal Jacob van Rijs has noted: “Walking toward the golden building over the red carpet will turn each visitor into a star.”
Ragnarock is the first phase of redevelopment of the site, a one-time concrete plant that COBE, which is based in nearby Copenhagen, and the Dutch firm MVRDV are transforming into a creative hub for musicians and artists. Still to come are a high school, performance spaces, and headquarters for the Roskilde Festival, one of Europe’s largest outdoor music events.
A closer view of the studded façade.
Conceived as a glittering gateway to the future complex, the 33,000-square-foot museum contains galleries with interactive displays and listening stations, an auditorium for special programs, and a café and bar area. The ground-floor walls and ceiling continue the pyramidal studding of the exterior, only the color is an arresting crimson, evoking a guitar case’s velvet lining while also calling to mind recording studio acoustic tiles. The entire experience of moving through the building is intended to echo the life of a rock star: the red-carpet welcome, the rise to fame as one ascends to the second-floor galleries and auditorium, and ending, the designers note, with “the inevitable fall down to the bar.”
