Written by Amanda David
This year’s Serpentine Pavilion, A Capsule in Time, was designed by Bangladeshi architect and educator Marina Tabassum. Her work seeks an architectural language which is both contemporary and rooted in place, climate, context, culture and history. Tabassum’s design resonates with Serpentine South and continues Dame Zaha Hadid’s ethos of pushing the boundaries of architecture.
The 2025 Pavilion is elongated in the north-south direction and features a central court that aligns with Serpentine South’s bell tower. Inspired by the tradition of park-going and arched garden canopies that filter soft daylight through green foliage, the sculptural quality of the Pavilion is comprised of four wooden capsule forms with a translucent facade that diffuses and dapples light.
Built around a semi-mature Ginkgo tree – a climate resilient tree species that dates back to the early Jurassic Period – Tabassum’s Pavilion, like much of Tabassum’s previous projects, considers the threshold between inside and outside, the tactility of material, lightness and darkness, height and volume. Throughout the course of summer and into autumn the Gingko tree leaves will slowly shift from green to luminous gold-yellow.
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