The Kunstmuseum says that no building project in recent years in Stuttgart has aroused more attention than this new museum. The Berlin architectural office of Hascher + Jehle emerged as the winner of an international competition to design this contemporary and modern art building beside Stuttgart's Schlossplatz.  What appears to be a glass cube is in fact a glass envelope wrapped around a limestone core that houses one fifth of the exhibition space.  The rest of the collection is displayed in a disused tunnel system under the Kleiner Schlossplatz.  In all the museum has an exhibition area of 5,000 square meters.



By day the glass facade is the face of the museum but at night the glass becomes transparent revealing the stone building core inside. 



The architects explain that in the evening (forgive the awkward translation), "...   The outer glass envelope dissolves, the stone cube is lit in its natural color and makes the relationship with the adjacent Königsbau. ...


.... To achieve this effect, modern façade technology was necessary, each side of the façade is made up of ....  solar and heat protection coated white glass. A composite film keeps the two outer sheets together. The narrow gap to the inner pane is filled with argon gas, which improves the thermal insulation property ... as far as possible. ... The glass facade is suspended above a delicate construction of a steel girder grid on the top floor. Against the pressure of the wind facade and glass roof with 6 cm wide glass fins are stabilized. On top of the stone cube (sits) the all-glass museum restaurant with a total area of 420 m² (and) spectacular panoramic view of the city."