At London's National Gallery, a new, improved Sainsbury Wing makes its presence known on Leicester Square

Even a lifelong Londoner could never be quite sure how to enter the National Gallery. There was the main Portico, overlooking chaotic Trafalgar Square, obscured by flags, pillars and its sheer height. To the right is the lesser Getty Entrance, and a disused door to the other side. Then, in 1991, came the Sainsbury Wing, designed by postmodern pioneers Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, famously derided by the then Prince of Wales. It provided one more option to enter the permanent collection, if a dark, underwhelming one, lacking the grand welcome of the 1830s original. Last year, contractors found a typewritten note from benefactor Lord Sainsbury, proving even he was against elements of the design — it had been stuffed in one of the foyer’s reviled false columns.

Annabelle Selldorf leads a thoughtful architectural refresh

This weekend, Annabelle Selldorf, master builder of museums around the world, unveils the Sainsbury Wing’s long-awaited redesign. Along with heritage architect Alasdair Travers of Purcell, Martijn Slob of landscape architects Vogt and Hannah Lawson of Lawson Ward, Selldorf eliminated much of the dimness of the 1990s experience while opening up the entrance and forecourt and improving the connection with the neoclassical building next door, literally paving the way for a new generation of visitors.

Inside The Pigott Theatre. Photography: Edmund Sumner

The improvements come as the National Gallery celebrates 200 years in the art business. After the big reveal on 10 May, the entirety of the National Gallery, including all its major works, will be open to the public for a full year before portions close for the renovation of the Research Centre.

Selldorf, who won a competition to redesign the Wing held during the COVID closures, says she wanted to bring a ‘liveliness and energy’ that matched the National’s collection. ‘It’s obvious it wasn’t working, but how to resolve it in coherent terms was a result in not thinking about form and material but about attitude,’ she says.

Her team consulted hundreds of constituents to determine how to put a ‘friendly face’ on the solid facade, to give people freedom of movement and a place to congregate. That meant ‘liberating space’, as she said, from the foyer and the low mezzanine overhead. ‘The low ceiling in the entry made people feel less confident about moving further,’ says Selldorf, calling the mezzanine ‘a lid’. Cutting away from it and replacing the original darkened windows with clear treated glass provided, she says, ‘a sense of relief in terms of how light and space could flow. Taking it away was simply one of the most exciting moments I can remember.’

A byproduct of creating double-height voids from the mezzanine and replacing the glass was visibility from the outside in and the inside out. ‘It allows you to see people enjoying themselves,’ she says. ‘The architecture had to take a step back and let that happen.’ Today, visitors on every level of the Wing can see out into Trafalgar Square, from the action on the pavement to Nelson atop his column in the sky, and vice versa.

A new 'square within a square'; view of the Sainsbury Wing and Wilkins Building — A new ‘square within a square’. Photography: Edmund Sumner

Connecting city and gallery: new landscaping shapes the visitor journey

Aiding the architectural interventions at the facade was important work by Vogt, which eliminated an unused courtyard to the side and opened up the awkwardly hindered Jubilee Walk between the two structures. Pedestrians strolling down from Leicester Square on the newly defined path find themselves on equal footing with the gallery-goers inside, separated by the clear glass. Gabriele Finaldi, director of the National Gallery, says these landscaped aspects ‘mellowed the transition between the street and indoors. Removing the courtyard and pulling back created breathing space at the front of the gallery and shifts people to the portico at the left.’ Visitors emerging from the thrum of Trafalgar Square now have a ‘signal’ directing them inside, through the new ‘square within a square’.

The re-envisioned foyer has a café, meeting lounge, shop and circulating welcome staff. The original grand staircase, climbing up the improved glazed wall, accesses a new restaurant, bar and bookshop. Removing a large cloakroom increased these ancillary spaces by 60 per cent. Those controversial non-structural columns have been relocated, along with pillars and a feature wall, to improve sightlines and circulation. For continuity, the architects used a similar Pietra Serena limestone as their primary finish.

The second-storey pathway to the main galleries next door is still far from obvious. A subterranean connection beneath Jubilee Walk will emerge in future renovations. But a highlight of the plan is the reworked Roden Centre for Creative Learning to the rear, with its delicate ‘fragment wall’. Lawson designed the playful pastiche of architectural styles using different types of timber taken from old paintings and frames.

The net positives are hardly the sort of radical adjustments that provoke ire among the establishment. Though there are always critics champing at the bit. ‘It’s not a foregone conclusion that everyone is going to like what you like,’ says Selldorf, ‘but dialogue and authenticity go a long way to a solid argument.’ And anyway, she says, ‘I was meant to live on the edge.’