MUMO (Museum of Motorcycle in Puerto Octay, North Patagonia, CHILE)

Located on the outskirts of Puerto Octay in Chile’s North Patagonia, the Museum of Motorcycles (MUMO) houses the country’s largest collection of antique motorcycles. The collection highlights machines from the early and mid-20th century, a period before the global market shifted toward mass production and corporate brands in the 1970s, offering insight into a more diverse and experimental era of motorcycle culture. 

The design draws from southern Chile’s wood-building traditions, inherited from German colonization in the 19th century, while embracing contemporary timber technology. The museum’s piano nobile exhibition hall is composed of three staggered wooden pavilions elevated on a stepped concrete plinth, oriented to capture views of the surrounding landscape. Constructed of CNC-machined laminated pino insigne (a local fir species), the volumes are clad in thermally modified fir to enhance weather resistance, reinforcing the cultural identity of “a wooden building clad in wood.”

Internally, the overlapping pavilions segment the open exhibition hall without dividing it, providing natural pauses in the curatorial sequence. Each pavilion consists of a pair of woven wooden beams that turn each roof plane into a rigid diaphragm connected it to its neighbor through steel rings disguised as skylights. These skylit joints admit natural light and highlight the crafted timber structure.

Prefabricated CNC-machined kits enabled precision assembly, while simplified timber-to-timber connections eliminated the need for heavy gusset plates or flanges, advancing the efficiency of local construction methods. MUMO stands as both a cultural landmark and a contemporary timber achievement, rooted in tradition yet defined by innovation, echoing the ingenuity of the machines it preserves.