Dundee’s V&A to take centre stage in Festival of Architecture finale
● City landmarks to be illuminated as part of Light Nights celebration
Dundee’s new V&A museum is set to be turned into an illuminated work of art – two years before the waterfront attraction opens to the public.
A host of the city’s most striking landmarks will also become the backdrop for spectacular light shows at the finale of a year-long celebration of Scotland’s best architecture in November.
Special effects will be installed on the vast construction site of Japanese architect Kengo Kuma’s V&A building, which will be the only design museum in the UK outside London when it is completed.
The city’s 15th century “Steeple”, Scotland’s oldest surviving medieval tower, plus a 16th century graveyard, a former printworks where annuals including The Beano and Dandy were made in the 1960s and 1970s, the Mcmanus Galleries and the Caird Hall will all be included.
Leading artists will be creating special installations for the Festival of Architecture “Light Nights”, which will also feature a torchlight procession, choir singing, pyrotechnics, theatre productions, an architectural walking trail and a night-time market.
Giant-sized pods which create light waves and “massage-like
0 The new V&A museum on Dundee waterfront is due to open in summer 2018. The construction site will be lit up this November movements” will be installed on the street of the city centre to direct passers-by to Slessor Gardens, the city’s new waterfront park, which overlooks the V&A site.
More than 400 events are part of the architecture festival, which will also announce the winner of a poll to honour the best building in Scotland over the last 100 years at the Light Nights opening on 18 November.
Philip Long, director of V&A Dundee, said: “The illumination of V&A Dundee under construction, showing off the remarkable supporting structure containing the walls of the museum’s growing, dynamic form, will be a fantastic sight.
“As a Unesco-designated City of Design, Dundee has an exciting time ahead. Light Nights will be a great way of getting people involved in this.”
David Dunbar, chairman of the Festival of Architecture said: “It is a very fitting way to bring the festival to a close by celebrating Dundee’s fine architecture of the past and the future.”