Danish urban design

 

It was a beautiful day today, warm and sunny. I went around Nørrebro in Copenhagen, where I live, and took some pictures of vibrant urban life. Here are some shoots.

The place where I live is very alternative and people have very different lifestyle here.  There is no any similar quarter with the same buildings, people background. Every 500m it seems that you are in  a totally different place. Many foreigners, hipsters,  students, young families with children of all races and creeds. There is a pile of snack places with very different food, which are kept by the locals.

Recently, there were developed many public spaces, made by famouse danish urban designers. For example The Red Square, with all shades of red on the pavement, on the walls, on the swings and so on. Life on the area is in full swing.
Literally next door is another park , which was conceived with the young living in the nearby quarter, that is the most criminal in the area. Park is brightly painted, stocked climbing wall, bars, skate pool, etc. m. There is full of people on of all ages in a sunny day.

Grafitti art is a quite an issue in the area, it is just everywhere.  Discharged special walls for painting,  “free artists” paint everywhere. In my photo guys are refreshing their graffiti painting and a sceptical girl is watching from the bike stroller. By the way, they are painting on the building site fence and all those drawings are updated regularly.

So how do you like this urban design? Is this something you would enjoy in your living area?
The last picture is me, looking very sceptical. I criticize the design space due to the lack of greenery and an overabundance of hard surfaces: asphalt, concrete, this is not sustainable urban design in my book. 🙂

Copenhagen’s Red Square

Recently I have seen those pictures of the famous Superkilen project on the Facebook, and they are very popular, and than I realised that it could be interesting to describe it. I live just around the corner of that place and pass it everyday, so I can post more fresh reports from there then anyone else does. As the square is still under construction and  there is no public life yet, it got plenty of attention mostly because it is painted in all possible red tones.

This picture was taken from http://www.guerrilla-innovation.com

and I have seen the same one in the Facebook. Quite fascinating, hah?

From this picture you can see the Nørrebrogade below where is the bus appears and the big roofs of Nørrebro Hall above.

The Superkilen is located at the Nørrebro district in Copenhagen, area where work people lived since its founding, but now it is a focus area for transformation. There is a multicultural atmosphere due to many foreigners and relevant cheap housing. Nørrebro is full of life day and night, the streets attract people to visit different ethnical shops, eating places, fruit markets and so on. Nørrebrogade is the central artery that has an essential amount of street activities on the daily basis. In 2008 municipality started en experimental traffic project at Nørrebrogade, that main purpose was to reduce car traffic and create wider bicycle lanes and sidewalk. The experiment showed increased amount of bicyclists and walkers, so now the street is under construction. Some parts of the street become one-way bus lane, on others parts car lanes are much narrow and bike lanes are wider up to 3 meters. Sidewalk is expanded so the cafes and shops can have outside tables and stands. The bus lane is painted bright orange color to indicate the one-way street for drivers.

Now back to the square.

The Copenhagen’s Red square is located around 5-6 min bike from the start of Nørrebrogade, and it just nearby Nørrebro Hallen, the multipurpose sport and life activity center for locals, the renovated old industrial building. There is also library around the corner and other sport and culture places. The square position is perpendicular to the Nørrebrogade and it is also part of the green bicycle route connecting different parts of Copenhagen. So the place has a great potential to become a true vital center not only for locals but for the passers-by as well.

The square is a part of  extensional development Superkilen that rich the border of the Nørrebro on the other side. Superkilen itself is divided to be the Red Square (place for street games), The Green Park (meeting point for locals) where the soft hills are designed,and the Black Square (a place with a new outdoor market).

As far as I can see the Red Square is almost finished, the Green Park is kind of half done and the Black Square is just started to develop.

So let’s sneak a bit and see how the exciting Red Square is going look like. Different variation of red colors  make it very bright, especially for the grey Copenhagen weather almost all year around. The square’s floor offer different courts for all kinds of street ball games, badminton, hockey, ping-pong and other city sports. Such a constant flow of sport will hopefully attract young people to do something more healthy than just drinking beer, smoke and doing drugs.

The signs and square’s furniture is also quite special due to its international origins from different countries all over the globe. Here you can find index marks and advertising signs from China, Russia, USA, some furniture comes from Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Kuwait, bike racks from Norway, playground from Japan etc. That symbolizes a multiethnic and cultural tolerance at Nørrebro. There are lives more than 60 nationalities at Nørrebro.

Superkilen development is designed by Superflex, BIG and TOPOTEK1.

The cost of  whole development (the Red Square, the Green Park and the Black Square) is 13.4 mln Euro with a part of subsidy from Real Dania foundation of 6.7mln Euro.

Don’t miss my entry about the square opening soon!