The intervention is the result of the 2011 competition won by the Barcelona architectural firm, which was organized for the transformation of an urban area in the core of the city, just a few steps from the railway station, into a new public art center. In a site overlooking the railway tracks, which was initially occupied by a large complex destined to the storage and repair of trains, Barozzi Veiga adopted the strategy of de-densification as a tool for urban resignification and regeneration. In this way, around the void of a new public space that is directly connected with Place de la Gare, the designers isolated two pure volumes: one has a square floor plan and is destined to host the Mudac – Musée Cantonal de design et d’arts appliqués contemporains, then realized on a project by the Portuguese studio Aires Mateus; the other one has a rectangular floor plan and is indeed destined for the Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts. The memory of the place is evoked by the designers’ striking expressive choice, that is to give shape to the new museum through the addition of two volumes: the portion of one of the existing buildings, a former wagon storage that is directly connected with the railways, is wedged in an impressive parallelepiped that is over 145 meters long, 21.5 meters wide and 22 meters tall.