Lisbon Oceanarium

Brief Information

The building of the Lisbon Oceanarium was conceived as an aircraft carrier moored in an inland sea. This form matters not as an outward whim: it immediately connects the oceanarium with the water around it and with the exhibition past of the Park of Nations, where Expo 1998 took place.

Inside, the main idea is built around one large central aquarium. Its depth of 7 meters allows open-water inhabitants to swim above the bottom, while visitors see not a display case with fish, but a space resembling a fragment of the ocean. The water temperature is chosen so that tropical fish and species from temperate latitudes can live in the same volume; therefore the proximity of sharks, rays, tuna, barracudas, and moray eels here is not merely a collection of rare animals, but part of a carefully conceived overall scene.

What to Notice First

It is worth noticing how the illusion of a single ocean is arranged. The central aquarium opens through four large acrylic panes on the sides and smaller panes around it: because of this, the volume reads not as a separate tank, but as a broad aquatic environment. Around it are four aquariums with different natural zones: the rocky North Atlantic coast, the Antarctic shoreline, the kelp forests of the northern Pacific Ocean, and the tropical coral reefs of the Indian Ocean.

Large acrylic sheets separate these zones from the central aquarium, but they are meant to create the feeling of one large aquarium. This is the main principle for viewing: compare boundaries and connections, not only individual animals. On the first floor, 25 themed aquariums are added to this system. One particular fact changes the way one sees the collection itself: the ocean sunfish is possible here because the oceanarium is among the few places capable of meeting its strict requirements for care.