Ondaatje Wing, National Portrait Gallery
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Reconfiguration and expansion of an existing four-storey Victorian art gallery, to include multi-storey exhibition space and café
The Ondaatje Wing creates a new heart to the National Portrait Gallery, increasing the public and exhibition space by 50 per cent and significantly upgrading visitor facilities.
The wing incorporates a dramatic central hall, lecture theatre, state-of-the-art IT gallery and two new exhibition spaces, called the Balcony Gallery and the Tudor Gallery. The Balcony Gallery is suspended on cables from the Tudor Gallery and flanked by a walkway that overlooks the central hall. Within the wing, a series of four metre-high partitions, which are staggered to allow reflected natural light into the exhibition space, partially enclose the gallery.
There is a 100-seat rooftop restaurant designed as an implied loggia, with a sloping lead roof and fully-glazed southern facade to maximise the breathtaking views over Whitehall and Trafalgar Square.
Data
- Completed: May 2000
- Sector: Arts and culture
- Address: St Martin's Place, London, WC2H 0HE, United Kingdom
Professional Team 
- Architect: Dixon Jones
- Project architects: Chris Milan, Edward Jones, John Moran, Nigel Bailey, Sir Jeremy Dixon
- Client: National Portrait Gallery, London
- Quantity surveyor: Gleeds
- Main contractor: Wallis / Norwest Holst Construction
- Structural engineer: Arup
- Electrical engineer : Arup
- Drainage consultant: Arup
Suppliers
- Fire consultant: Arup Fire
- Acoustic consultant: Arup Acoustics
- Lighting consultant: Evolution
- Archaeological consultant: Arup