Striking New Design Museum Opens

HOLON, Israel, March 5, 2010— -- Visitors to the Design Museum of Holon crane their necks to get a better view of the striking red and orange steel waves looping overhead. Israel's first design museum opened to the public Thursday, making it one of only a handful of design museums in the world.

The building's architect, Israeli Ron Arad, is considered to be one of the world's top five architects, and the museum already has won the Conde Nast Traveller Innovation and Design Award. The design museum is Arad's first project in his home country.

"Even I can get surprised by views and aspects that I haven't seen before when I wander around the museum," Arad said. "It's different every different second of the day because a great part of it frames the sky in a very amazing way. I notice that everyone who walks in just has to look up."

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The bold, swirling design of the building was modeled after the movement of ribbons.

"These ribbons really allowed us to make some very dangerous and experimental assumptions about what these ribbons could do for us structurally, in terms of flying in the air," said Asa Bruno, director of Ron Arad Architects. "It's very difficult to make 300 tons of steel fly in the air, and this required some very careful engineering."

Galit Gaon, the creative director of the museum, spoke of the "spiraling embrace" of the building's structure.

"The building itself is the biggest object in our collection," Gaon said.

The museum's first exhibit, called the "State of Things: Design in the 21st Century," showcases more than 100 products portraying the consumption and impact of contemporary international design. The exhibit contains pieces so modern they only could have been created in the last few years.