Given this depressing situation, the new Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein National Campus for the Archaeology of Israel, which is going up near the Israel Museum and the Bible Lands Museum, is good news. Construction is still underway and at least 14 months will be needed to finish it, but even at this stage it’s easy to perceive the building’s archaeological language.The article has a lot of details about the Schottenstein Campus, but it's a premium article, so read it now before it goes behind the paywall.
Among the better efforts, the idea is to do as little as possible to undermine Jerusalem's delicate fabric, and Moshe Safdie and Irit Kohavi get a high grade for meeting this challenge.
The proposal for the Schottenstein campus came up after the Oslo Accords over two decades ago. East Jerusalem’s future wasn’t clear, and because the Rockefeller archaeological museum was already there, it was thought a new building should go up.
The planning was delayed until 2006 and the building was conceived with a number of other functions. It will house the Israel Antiquities Authority, storerooms for some 2 million artifacts, laboratories, a magnificent library and exhibition space. The 35,000-square-meter (376,737-square-foot) structure will have nine stories and cost 400 million shekels ($104 million) to build.
Background here and links.
