Finely attuned to its environment, the Museum faces the city to its south, and has the mountain to its back in the north, where the wall is designed to expect the strong winds for which it has been fortified. Small windows and thick walls protect against the climate’s elements, which can be scorching heat and extreme cold alike. In regards to its interior, the building has been designed as though it were made up of two distinct spaces: a guest house and a museum. The former contains a private collection, while the latter is open to the public. Traditional building materials and techniques were used, making their product one of conscious integration in history and the day-to-day reality of the region. This is not a delicate construction of sophisticated intricacy, but rather of calculated simplicity. Each of its features corresponds to either a natural need or to a custom, all the way down to the bird’s nest found to the building’s south: Swallows used to nest there before the museum’s construction, which briefly had deprived them of their home, but made sure to welcome them back. It is the same philosophy that makes the Museum look as much as an observatory, with its dome and windows, as a refuge, forbidding and inaccessible. 

There appears to be no true allegiance to either image. Most probably, the true meaning of its design is exactly that it should “emerge in harmony with the nature and perish of itself as time goes by”, as its architects suggest. Meanwhile, its skylights, stairs, environment-conscious design, in fact so many of its features, offer a meaningful pause. For the building’s aesthetic might be to look as bare as the desert, but it is nowhere near as barren.