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Contest launched to find design team for Liverpool maritime quarter
National Museums Liverpool is leading on 10-year waterfront masterplan
National Museums Liverpool (NML) is looking for a design team to work on its 10-year plan to redevelop the city’s waterfront.
It is hoped that the project will play a significant role in the post-Covid regeneration of the region by creating an environment that will benefit museums, residents, visitors and businesses. Liverpool’s waterfront is an Unesco World Heritage site.
The scheme focuses on the area between the Royal Albert Dock and Mann Island and includes a plan to expand the International Slavery Museum, which is currently on the third floor of the Merseyside Maritime Museum, into the adjacent Dr Martin Luther King Jr Building (formerly the Dock Traffic Office). The maritime museum will also be redeveloped.
The project will improve the accessibility of Canning Dock by creating new pedestrian bridges and will better utilise building such as the Cooperage, Mermaid House, Pilotage Building, Piermaster’s House and Great Western Railway Building.
“The Canning Dock is a hugely important public space with great potential, and it is so important that we deliver the needs of existing and new communities – offering people a space where they can gather to laugh, learn, play and relax,” said Laura Pye, the director of NML.
"We want to transform people’s experiences into something memorable, but importantly this project also presents us with the opportunity to represent the historic significances of the site. We want to integrate the feedback and ideas directly from our communities, who far too often are underrepresented – we want to make it a space for all.”
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The competition to find a multi-disciplinary team is being be managed by Colander Associates on behalf of NML and is supported by £120,000 from the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority as part of the Race Equality Programme launched by Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram last year.
Those interested in applying for the competition should submit initial expressions of interest by midday on 23 April.
NML has eight venues and attracted more than 3 million visitors in 2019.
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