The inspiration for the landscape surrounding the new Mærsk Building was found in the history of the location and it’s unique atmosphere. The Panum Institute is an educational institution with a long history and tradition as well as a modern research central, with thousands of daily users.
The new landscape facilitates the meeting between past and future, nature and urbanity in an inviting, green urban space – a recreative urban landscape for the students of Panum as well as the locals – right in the centre of Nørrebro’s busy street life.
The green roof is part of SLA’s SUND Nature Park, which is a new type of urban campus park that supports the good students’ life and provides a wide range of natural and social values to the city. The large public green roof offers a variety of outdoor study places, green lounge areas and new opportunities for social gatherings for researchers, students and ordinary citizens. The green roof is designed with a high degree of wild nature, which re-establishes Copenhagen’s old public Grass Commons, which until the 1840s stretched all the way to the borough of Nørrebro. In addition, a number of exotic tree species have been added as a nod to the multicultural Nørrebro, while at the same time making roof, building and park more sustainable and resilient towards future climate change.
“The SUND Nature Park and its green roof offer a number of new functional and social values for Nørrebro. The strong nature of the roof has a specially designed earth layer that creates self-regulated ecosystems, which can handle even 100-year rain events and recycles the rain water in the park and in the building. The roof is designed with extremely high biodiversity with native meadows and large trees. The roof is publicly accessible from both the building and the park, enabling everyone to experience Copenhagen’s new wildlife up close,” says Stig L. Andersson, founder and design director in SLA.
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
Type: 1st prize, The Scandinavian Green Roof Award
Client: Bygningsstyrelsen and University of Copenhagen
Design period: 2012
Completed: 2017
Area: 37.000 m2
Partners: C.F. Møller, Rambøll, Aggebo & Henriksen
text & images: SLA, Landezine
laud8 -landscape architecture+urban design 