National Maritime Museum in Tianjin nominated for architecture Oscar

The National Maritime Museum of China, designed by the Tianjin Architecture Design Institute, was recently nominated for the International BIM Competition, considered by architects to be the "Oscars of Architecture".

The steel frame of the National Maritime Museum in Tianjin. [Photo/Xinhua]

The Museum, located in Binhai New Area, Tianjin city, contains four venues and a central hall. The five parts are linked and made to look like four fishes jumping into the ocean to express the connection of land and sea.

The four venues were built with more than 17,000 tons of steel in a truss structure system with super-elevation and a long-span gate. The ceiling has 137 trusses, 112 of which are gate-typed. The central hall is made with 25 fish-belly shaped trusses. The sizes, structures and installation angles of all the trusses are different.

The framing of the four fish-shaped venues of the National Maritime Museum. [Photo/Xinhua]

The museum cost more than two billion yuan ($296 million) and is expected to open in May of 2017.

The competition invites experts from various countries to be judges and includes categories for municipal infrastructure, architecture and construction.