This Dundee-themed museum was once planned for the city’s waterfront
- Andrew Batchelor
- Jul 20
- 3 min read
Long before the V&A Dundee became the centrepiece of the city’s waterfront, another vision was quietly proposed—one rooted deeply in Dundee’s own identity.
Designed in 2010 by Georgios Tsorman of the Edinburgh College of Art, the Museum of Life Dundee was an ambitious concept that imagined a cultural space telling the city’s story through architecture, sustainability, and community connection.
Although the project never went ahead, and was eventually overtaken by the V&A Dundee, the Museum of Life remains a fascinating “what if” in Dundee’s recent history.
The proposal was part of a wider reimagining of the waterfront, aiming to reconnect the city centre with the River Tay. At the time, the area was dominated by roads and concrete that disconnected Dundee from its south-facing shoreline.
The new vision would shift traffic away from the heart of the city, creating shared pedestrian and cycling routes, green spaces, new housing, commercial units, and a redesigned train station—with the Museum of Life at its core.
Tsorman’s design championed local heritage and sustainability. Building materials were to include recycled aggregates, terracotta, rusted metal, natural gravels, and native stone.
Street furniture would be repurposed, while green roofs and living walls would support biodiversity and even provide space for residents to grow food. Geothermal paving and heat pumps were also part of the design, showcasing innovative ways to draw energy from the natural environment.
The museum building itself followed the shape of the old harbour walls, anchoring the design in Dundee’s dockside past.
It included a southwest-facing restaurant and a library overlooking the Tay. The exhibition gallery was perhaps the most striking element—designed to resemble a rusted oil rig, partly suspended above the water.
During high tide, the structure’s lower floor would appear to float. Cone-shaped features brought natural light into the underwater level and transferred the sound of waves throughout the building, symbolically linking Dundee’s strong maritime past to its cultural future.
Although the Museum of Life was never realised, Dundee’s waterfront was still transformed. In its place came the V&A Dundee—a bold, internationally recognised museum that changed how the world viewed the city.
Since opening in 2018, the V&A Dundee has welcomed over 2 million visitors, created hundreds of jobs, and positioned Dundee as a global destination for design.
Designed by Kengo Kuma, its dramatic appearance has drawn both praise and critique.
Some have pointed to the building’s vast interior voids and unused space, but it’s hard to deny its achievements: high-profile exhibitions, strong visitor numbers, and its role in reshaping Dundee’s cultural image.
More than just a building, the V&A Dundee has helped shift the city’s narrative—from post-industrial decline to creative innovation. It carries forward the ambition once imagined by the Museum of Life, just through a different lens.
And interestingly, while the Museum of Life may never have been built, some of its ideas feel oddly ahead of their time.
Its focus on sustainability, public green space, education, and architectural storytelling shares some visual and thematic similarities with another upcoming landmark—Eden Project Dundee.
While this is speculative, it’s not hard to imagine how elements of the Museum of Life could inspire or be repurposed in the Eden Project’s development.
Both aim to reconnect people with the natural world, both challenge the traditional museum model, and both are designed to regenerate the city in bold, immersive ways.
In the end, the Museum of Life Dundee may have been left on the drawing board, but the spirit of transformation it represented lives on—etched into the waterfront, into the city’s identity, and into the way Dundee continues to imagine its future
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