Musée des Confluences

The Musée des Confluences is defined by its deconstructivist architecture, a jagged assembly of glass and stainless steel that appears to hover above the riverbank. Designed by the Austrian firm Coop Himmelb(l)au and opened in December twenty fourteen, the building is composed of two primary structures: a transparent, multifaceted "crystal" and a gravity-defying, steel-clad "cloud." It stands at the precise southern tip of the peninsula where the Rhône and Saône rivers converge, a location intended to mirror the institution's purpose as a place where scientific and humanistic ideas meet.