Eight Art Galleries Where Raw Concrete Frames the Work

Four Pritzker Prize-winning architects anchor a new survey of eight concrete art galleries published by Dezeen, spanning the USA, Portugal, China, South Korea, Ghana and Germany. Peter Zumthor, Eduardo Souto de Moura, Tadao Ando and David Chipperfield Architects all appear in the roundup, which collects galleries where exposed concrete surfaces form contemplative settings for paintings and artworks.

The projects range from high-profile art museums to modest pavilions built around a single artwork. Together, they cover four continents. Here is what the survey contains.

What does Zumthor's Los Angeles gallery look like?

The David Geffen Galleries is a curving concrete extension to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, designed by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor. Wrapped in a ribbon of glazing, the elevated gallery snakes above street level and spans Wilshire Boulevard. Seven structural pavilions, scattered unevenly along the building's footprint, carry it. Takeaway: the gallery is both a bridge and a museum.

How does colour change the material?

In Cascais, Portugal, Casa das Histórias Paula Rego houses the works of artist Paula Rego. Portuguese architect Eduardo Souto de Moura designed it with two pyramid-like chimneys rising from red-concrete walls. The interior forms a sequence of rooms tailored to different formats, from small lithographs to large-scale paintings. Takeaway: the concrete itself supplies the building's colour.

What is happening in China?

Chinese studio ZAO/standardarchitecture created the Xiao Feng Art Museum in Hangzhou as an angular concrete building looping around a central courtyard. Dedicated to the artist couple Xiao Feng and Song Ren, the gallery rises and falls to form openings that guide visitors under bridge-like elements toward the courtyard.

A second Chinese project, the Ginkgo Gallery in Jiaxing by Dutch studio MORE Architecture, sits on an island in a manmade lake. Its scooped, board-marked concrete ceilings and walls create horizontal patterns across the surfaces. MORE Architecture designed it as an antidote to China's boom of large-scale museums. Takeaway: both buildings use concrete's plasticity rather than treating it as flat backdrop.

How big is Tadao Ando's subterranean dome?

Japanese architect Tadao Ando designed a subterranean concrete dome, 25 metres wide, to house a permanent installation by British sculptor Antony Gormley at Museum SAN in Wonju, South Korea. A central oculus looms over the cast-iron sculptures inside the cave-like space, named Ground. Takeaway: a single measured dimension, 25 metres, defines the entire room.

Which gallery was built for one sculpture?

At the Glenstone Museum in Maryland, American studio Thomas Phifer and Partners created a rectangular gallery for the works of sculptor Richard Serra. The building uses cast-in-place structural concrete and stainless-steel doors. A series of skylights provides the only source of light inside.

In Germany, David Chipperfield Architects returned to the Carmen Würth Forum site six years after completing its museum there, adding the monolithic Anselm Kiefer Pavilion around a singular artwork. Anselm Kiefer's Schwarze Flocken, once too big to exhibit at the museum, now hangs on the pavilion wall, illuminated by rooflights. Takeaway: two galleries, two single-artist programmes, both lit only from above.

What about smaller institutions?

Nubuke Extended in Ghana is a one-room concrete gallery extension to the Nubuke Foundation, designed by architect Baerbel Mueller and architectural designer Juergen Strohmayer. The structure was raised above the ground to form a shaded events and gathering space below. Its interior features high ceilings and a mezzanine level. Takeaway: concrete works at the scale of a single room, not only for flagship museums.

The roundup, published on 7 November 2026, suggests the material's hold on gallery design remains firm, with recent projects from 2024 to 2026 making up half the list.