Chongqing Three Gorges Museum

Chongqing Three Gorges Museum

The Chongqing Three Gorges Museum is a national AAAA-level tourist attraction and a patriotic education base.

The Chongqing China Three Gorges Museum is a non-profit cultural and educational institution dedicated to the protection, research, and exhibition of historical and cultural heritage as well as environmental evidence from Chongqing and the Three Gorges region. It serves as an important cultural infrastructure for promoting and nurturing national spirit. The China Three Gorges Museum was jointly established and co-built with the Chongqing Museum, and will henceforth operate under both names.

It is situated at the western end of the Chongqing People's Great Hall, one of Asia’s top ten classic 20th-century buildings. Between them lies the 40,000-square-meter Chongqing People's Square, together forming a “trinity” of iconic urban architecture. If the Chongqing People's Great Hall was the defining structure of 1950s Chongqing, then the China Three Gorges Museum represents the iconic building of early 21st-century Chongqing — a radiant jewel embedded in the heart of this mountainous garden city.

The main structure of the Chongqing China Three Gorges Museum boasts a grand and profound presence. In addition to its front side, which forms a trinity with the People's Square and the People's Great Hall, the rest of the building follows the natural terrain and blends seamlessly with the mountain landscape. Leveraging the elevation differences and combining enclosed and semi-enclosed architectural forms, the design creates a garden landscape themed around mountains and water. Its gently undulating form appears as if it has grown and been sculpted directly from the mountain itself.

The project occupies a total site area of 2.9316 hectares. The main structure is 157.3 meters long and 98.085 meters wide, with a total above-ground height of 25.2 meters across five floors. The total floor area is 42,497 square meters, classifying it as a Class I high-rise building. The underground level houses artifact storage, parking, and equipment rooms, while the four above-ground levels include exhibition halls, lecture theaters, and administrative support facilities. The building features a reinforced concrete frame structure with a seismic fortification intensity of 6 degrees, a frame seismic grade of III, and both structural safety and fire resistance ratings of Grade I. The building is designed to last over 100 years.

The overall layout of the Chongqing China Three Gorges Museum is designed around a central axis that aligns with the east-west orientation of the People's Great Hall. This axis connects the People's Square and the museum’s main structure through a unified form, creating a seamless “trinity” effect. Along this axis, the People's Great Hall, the People's Square, and the museum flow together in a dynamic yet balanced composition, achieving a four-dimensional “trinity” effect (including the movement of people). Through the decomposition and integration of the unified form, variations in elevation, and contrasts in texture, a simple yet richly symbolic graphic is formed.

The integrated form of the People's Square and the museum is connected by a giant pipa (lute) pattern. Looking westward from the People's Great Hall on the eastern end, the glass roof of the museum’s main structure glistens under sunlight like the rising sun emerging from the water (the front pool) and the mountains (the rocky-shaped exhibit halls), exuding vitality.

Looking eastward from the museum’s western end, the People's Great Hall is embraced by the harmonious curves of the People's Square. This juxtaposition highlights a historical dialogue between two landmark buildings from different eras — the museum and the People's Great Hall. The People's Square becomes the perfect stage for this vivid and engaging dialogue. Such a lively and playful exchange not only emphasizes historical and societal humanistic care but also showcases the people of Chongqing’s aspirations for the future.

Chongqing is a city rich in historical and cultural heritage and distinguished revolutionary traditions, and is recognized as a famous historical and cultural city in China.

Meanwhile, the Three Gorges Project is a globally renowned mega-project, and the accompanying salvage and preservation of Three Gorges cultural relics is also a widely watched endeavor. Therefore, the Chongqing China Three Gorges Museum, as a flagship museum for collecting, researching, and exhibiting the local history and culture of Chongqing, serves not only as a permanent repository of Three Gorges historical culture but also as an enduring monument to the civilization of the Three Gorges Project.

The vision of the Chongqing China Three Gorges Museum is to be “a leader in the west, first-class in the nation, and influential worldwide.” It will become a symbol of Chongqing’s urban culture, a window into its civic civilization, and a calling card of its urban spirit.

In 2007, the China Three Gorges Museum was commended by the National Cultural Heritage Administration as an advanced collective in the field of national cultural heritage protection.

Further reading:

· China National First-Class Museums