Designed by Studio Architektoniczne Kwadrat, The Museum of the Second World War is built on a lot at Władysław Bartoszewski Square near the center of the city. It is located in a symbolic architectural space, which is also a space of memory, 200 meters from the historic Polish Post Office in Gdańsk and 3 kilometers across the water from Westerplatte Peninsula, both of which were attacked in September 1939.
Photography: Pawel Paniczko
The 1,700-square-metre lot set aside for the museum touches the Radunia Canal to the west, while its south side opens onto a wide panorama of the Motława River. Today, these are the outskirts of Old Gdańskbut, soon, it will be the core of the modern section of the city that will replace its shipyard.
Jurors of the competition for the museum’s architectural plan have described it as “a new symbol of Gdańsk”, “a new icon” and a “sculptural design”. Daniel Libeskind, the jury’s chairman and one of the world’s best-known architects, designer of the Jewish Museum Berlin, justified the selection of the project as “Using the language of architecture, the selected project narrates the tragedy of the past, the vitality of the present, and opens the horizons of the future. The rising, dynamic form symbolizes the museum below while giving a panoramic and spectacular orientation to the historic city and its future. Echoing the iconic skyline of Gd...