Glossy floors, rough-sawn wood and diffused natural light create a calming atmosphere inside this private museum in Chinese city Shoutou, designed to display a collection of aged fish bladders.
Local studio Jingu Phoenix Space Planning Organization, also known as JG Phoenix, designed the private fish maw museum for a client who spent decades gathering a collection of swim bladders.

The organs, known as maws, give fish their buoyancy and are considered a delicacy in China that is typically served in soups or stews.
The collector wanted to create a space where he could display the dried bladders and communicate their history and value. The museum is intended to celebrate the natural beauty of the objects, which are displayed in a setting designed to complement their unique physical properties.
"The designers deconstructed the spatial functions via architectural languages, and adopted grey as the main hue, so as to highlight the gold, aged fish maws that carry the memories of time," said JG Phoenix.
"In addition, they utilised old oak timber and gave it sawtooth grain through a special treatment," the studio added. "The aged texture and colour of oak wood coincide with those of fish maws, which generates dialogue between the materials and the collection."

Visitors enter the museum through an arched opening leading to a double-height space with an introductory text on the wall.
The space is traversed by an exposed concrete beam that expresses t...