Estonian Road Museum
Location
Varbuse, Põlva county, Estonia
Client
Estonian Road Museum
Size
13 000 m2
Design
2004, 2nd prize
Completed
2010
Competition team
Maarja Kask, Karli Luik, Ralf Lõoke
Design team
Maarja Kask, Karli Luik, Ralf Lõoke, Pelle-Sten Viiburg
Exposition design
Laika, Belka & Strelka OÜ
Awards
Annual Award of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia 2010
Concrete Building of the Year in Estonia: Special Prize 2010
Estonian Union of Landscape Architects: Deed of the Year 2010
Estonian Road Museum is a 13 000 square metre open-air exhibition grounds with a mixture of layers that combine leisure and education, experiential artificial and natural landscapes. The exhibition grounds is located on an open field, built across the road from the historical Varbuse postal station. Dating back to the 1830s, the old complex is now used as the museum’s main venue.
The concept of the exhibition grounds is based on a road that constantly changes times and situations like a life-size comic strip as one passes through the long 8-shaped path. All space necessary for the museum is scooped into the hilly South-Estonian landscape, leaving the rest of the environment as natural as possible. The structure is built of reinforced concrete with wood-paneled lavatory, ticket office and souvenir booth, authentic historical objects, e.g. roadside pub, gas station, bridge, segment of a railroad etc. and graphic concrete soften the architecture of the conveniently infrastructure-like edifice.












