Designed by the French-based Lebanese architect Lina Ghotmeh, this year’s Serpentine Pavilion is a deceptively simple structure made of glulam beams and timber posts, providing Kensington Gardens, one of London’s grand central parks, with an ornate wooden tent. Now in its third decade, the annual Serpentine Pavilion program is, as Ghotmeh puts it, about creating “a temporary smart pavilion that has an intense life for a few months.” Built on the lawn in front of a neoclassical building that was originally a tea room and is now the southern building of the Serpentine Gallery, each pavilion “reflects on the zeitgeist,” says Ghotmeh. “It's a structure that has a message.” 

Lina Ghotmeh. Photo © Gilbert Hage