The Fondazione di Venezia decided to entrust the architectural planning of M9 to the winner of a competition, entirely of its own volition and without any particular law obliging this, in the conviction that the best solution for how to give Mestre back an important and central urban area might develop from the confrontation of different philosophies and planning ideas. In the autumn of 2008 a Technical Committee, coordinated by Professor Francesco Dal Co, was formed with the specific mandate of defining the way in that a contest with invited competitors could be held, which – given the desire to bring to fruition the M9 project – immediately took shape as a planning competition and not one merely of ideas. In December of 2009 – having signed the papers for the Programme Agreement with the relevant institutions authorising the town planning variations necessary for the carrying out of the project – the Fondazione di Venezia identified and contacted six firms of architects. They were entrusted with the difficult project of undertaking the restructuring for commercial purposes of a convent complex, rendered unrecognizable by continuous reorganisation and decades of neglect, placing alongside it a new museum building in which – and within a maximum height of 30 metres and a total volume of 40,000cu.m – to develop a gross surface of at least 8,000sq.m in addition to the basements. In addition was added the request to re-plan the whole arrangement of the area in terms of accessibility, functionality and liveableness.

To allow this result the Fondazione made available the results of two years of research on new museum architecture (from which the requirements and minimum requisites for the new building were deduced), exhaustive paper and photographic documentation and all of the results from the analysis conducted on both the land and existent structures in the area for the intervention.

All competitors were required to make a site visit, in order to personally establish the potential and criticisms of the area, also relative to the surrounding urban fabric, in order that the project might be channelled to confronting the existing reality.

Over the course of four months of the architectural competition, which officially began the 15th February 2010, the competitors were allowed to ask and received all the necessary supplementary information, via a session of articulated and probing questions and answers which brought each participant towards an elaborate finale, presented on the following 15th June.

According to the competition regulations each project is presented in:
  a variable number of A1 panels, including: the general plan of the area (scale 1:500), the plans of each level (including the basement and roofing, scale 1:200), the most important elevations and sections (scale 1:200), three-dimensional views and renderings of the internal and external spaces, construction details and diagrams of accessibility to the area and the buildings (in any technique and scale);
  a paper describing the projecting criteria, the structural system and the circuits, the museological conception and the costs and phases of realisation;
  a model of the area in scale 1:200.

The projects are judged by a judging panel of 7 members (in addition to two substitutes), on the basis of the quality of the architectural proposals and of their insertion into the existing urban contest, the flexibility of the use of the spaces (also in terms of mounting an exhibition for the museum spaces), in terms of the attention to eco-sustainability, energy saving, and with attention to the costs of realisation, management and maintenance of the entire complex.

The competition winner will also be entrusted with the definitive and executive planning: the Fondazione di Venezia has committed itself in this aspect by sending, together with the invitation to participate in the competition, a contract which the participants undersigned in acceptance. A reciprocal agreement to create a strong rapport of collaboration and trust, to guarantee the perfect result from the project.