KYQ4: V & A Dundee

Razzle Dazzle Wullie outside the V&A

V&A and RRS Discovery

Time Magazine has made the newly opened V&A design museum in Dundee one of its top 100 locations to visit. It was a dull day and, as Dundee is only an hour away, we decided to check it out. The proposal to build another V&A museum outside London had been made in 2007. Dundee was quick to seize the opportunity and offer a site as a key component in the redevelopment of the waterfront. I remember some of the early discussions with the Scottish Government. Some of us baulked at the initial cost of £41m, with the majority of funding coming from the City Council and Scottish Government at a time when austerity was beginning to bite and Dundee had some of the worst social and economic problems in Scotland.

Since then the costs have risen to £80m with £65m coming from the public purse. This is hardly surprising when an internationally acclaimed architect wins a design competition, the cost is the last thought and once agreed on the techniques of cost escalation are well understood by the architect and the construction companies. Kengo Kuma, the acclaimed Japanese architect, is no different than many others in this respect. His design is said to be based upon sea cliffs of northeast Scotland, although the resulting building seems far more akin to the cliffs on Orkney and Shetland that host thousands of nesting seabirds. Whatever the provenance of the design concept, it is alien to the vernacular style of Dundee on the Tay estuary which is one of the few flatlands on the Scottish coastline. We were prepared to be wowed but on a grey day, the building just added to the grimness of the seafront with Kuma's inverted pyramids of dark grey slabs of concrete suggesting that this was a building where the function would follow form.

The irregular slabs of concrete that were bolted onto the outward-leaning concrete walls were mirrored on the inside by rectangular planks of oak that were fixed in a random pattern. We met an architect from Hong Kong who had made the visit to see Kengo Kumar's latest building. He explained the idea behind the concrete slabs and the wooden planks was to reflect the complexity of nature. He thought that the rubber strips that were attached to the concrete slabs were to prevent birds from nesting and defecating on the building. If so, it would be disappointing because a couple of thousand guillemots or cormorants would have given some life to the building, although at some cost to the fabled fishing along the Tay.

The architect had no strong feelings for the building saying that it was a failure compared to the Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, which was the best museum that he had ever visited because it was designed with spaces to show off its collections. He thought the space in the V&A was largely wasted on cafes, and open spaces and that there was little exhibition space for such an expensive project. He thought it was probably a good place for older people to come for lunch.

Inside the building, there was plenty of space but most of it was located in the vast roof voids created by the inverted structure. It was unusable space and the main exhibition space, the Scottish Design Galleries, was no larger than could be found in the average municipal museum. The collection of Scottish Design artefacts from the V&A collection and sourced from other Scottish museum collections were eclectic and showed the importance of manufacturing, engineering excellence, textiles and video games.

The exhibits gave evidence of Scotland's inventiveness and name-checked the Scottish diaspora. The ironwork from the Saracan Foundry in Possilpark, Glasgow was exquisite and exported to all parts of the world. Along with the superb models of the Clyde-built boats, the collection provided interesting glimpses of Scottish Design. However, far more comprehensive collections of these items were previously found in the Kelvingrove and now the Transport Museum in Glasgow. The V&A provided only numerous snippets to this history of design although it had provided space for Mackintosh's Oak Tea Room to be on permanent display for the first time.

Another feature of the interior of the building was the narrow oblong portholes that were encased by the concrete external slabs. The minimal shafts of light were just a sample of what could and should have been picture frames for views of the Tay, with its snaking road and rail bridges and the Dundee waterfront. A poster of the 7:84 Theatre Group brought back fond memories of watching the plays during the late 1970s and 1980s at a time when Scotland was in meltdown from the collapse of its manufacturing industries and the decay of the public realm during the Thatcher years. Scotland will never forget this grim period in its history when it depended heavily on the EU for any new investment.

Whilst the visit had been worthwhile, it is not the sort of places like the Kelvingrove or the Museum of Scotland that demand repeat visits to savour the atmosphere as well as the splendid exhibits, it is too esoteric to reel you back. At £80m for 8500 square metres of floor space, it is a hugely expensive building, costing £9400 per square metre (psm). This compares with the typical UK construction costs for a hospital of £2580psm, a secondary school of £1750psm, a high rise air-conditioned office block of £1940psm, home for the elderly or mentally of £1830psm, or new social housing at £950psm.

Given that the main source of funding has been the Scottish public spending block, the question must be asked whether the V&A Dundee has merited the lavish expenditure that it has diverted from worthwhile and necessary public services. That excludes the £1.256m per annum contribution to the running costs that the Scottish government will be making for the next ten years in addition to the subsidies provided by Dundee City Council.