Library Buildings around the World

een added, with the intention of creating a new educational centre for Hagfors Kommune. The centre integrates lower
school, middle school, upper-secondary, adult education, a public library, a music school and a day care centre in one
coherent campus. The centre provides communal facilities for all users including auditoriums and lecture theatres, canteen
facilities and a café. The centre has a capacity for 1000 students and 150 staff. The overall concept behind the renovation and
extension is to create an overview and to give each unit its own identity. The characteristics of the new education centre is
bright rooms and strong colours creating a recognisable identity for the entire centre. (Moller)
Nord Architects, Copenhagen – Denmark
http://www.nord-web.dk
Libraries:
Kulturhus (Library) NordVest, Copenhagen – Denmark on design
Ordrup Multihal & Bibliotek, Copenhagen – Denmark 2005
Cooperation with: SRL Architects (Søren Robert Lund )
3.300 m²
Ordrup is a compact hybrid building with emphasis not only on design but also on the content. It is developed in a user driven design
process where a library, sports facilities, auditorium and teaching are weaved into one consistent building. The green iconographic
envelope are embracing these programs in one gesture allowing the difference of each component to become one. The idea about an
outer and inner compression / deformity is underlined in the choice of materials, where the outer shape is defined by a green glass
fiber coated façade which opens up, like a portal to the inner deformity. In the interior, the border between the different functions,
are a mix between concrete surfaces and open glass areas. These compressions and deformation motif are used on the vertical
surfaces and in the horizontal organization of the building and is recognizable as two different elements weaved together.
-In ground level all floors are green as a carpet of artificial grass. -On the first floor the grass and by that the nature, is pulled up by
the green slopes and creating a bridge throughout the building from east to west. As a central crossing point in the building the main
stair and the amfi stair are placed as an element that both express the vertical deformity of the figure, but also uses the horizontal
surfaces in the building. The stair is designed like a sculpture steel element and this gives the motif to the rest of the building surfaces
covered with steel. The iconographic character of the design allows for a renegotiation of the typology of the cultural building. It
neither expresses the dryness and dullness of the library nor the rigidity of the sports building. The envelopes iconographic nature
instead becomes a openness of interpretation, a building that will grow with its use. It becomes a building that reinterprets the
historian Greek gymnasium where body and soul where given equal weight. A building that will interact with its community and
perform as a new platform for developing cultural services for people of the twenty first century.
http://www.worldbuildingsdirectory.com )
Schmidt/Hammer/Lassen Architects, Aarhus – Denmark
http://www.shl.dk
Libraries:
Urban Mediaspace – Europlads, Aarhus – Denmark 2011 – 2014
Client: The Municipality of Aarhus. Client partner: Realdania, Area: 35,600 m² , Construction sum
€ 215 million excl. VAT, Competition 2009, first prize in restricted international competition
Other consultants during the competition: Bosch & Fjord Interior Design & Art, The Danish School of Librarians by Dr. art Henrik
Jochumsen and Dr. art Casper Hvenegaard Rasmussen
Urban Mediaspace will be Scandinavia’s largest public library and represents a new generation of modern hybrid libraries and thus
the building contains multiple potentials. The building is situated at the mouth of the Aarhus River in one of the most prominent
sites of the city centre of Aarhus.
Urban Mediaspace is part of the ambitious district plan to revitalise the former industrial cargo docks on the harbour front by
connecting the area both visually and physically to the historic centre of the city.
The leading idea is a covered urban space. A large heptagonal slice hovers above a glazed prism, which is resting on a square of ice
flake-shaped stairs fanning out to the edge of the sea. The ice flakes create wide plateaus and accommodate recreational activities
and outdoor events.
The heptagon will contain the media house administration and offices for rent. The glass building below is transparent and allows
passers-by visual access to the activities in the building while the users have a 360 degree panoramic view from the inside. The
library contains several divisions in staggered levels that cover literature and media areas, exhibitions, children’s theatre, interactive
activities, public events, cafés and restaurants and hence, they form an eventful promenade through the building.
Below ground the large parking area will be available to the whole city. Part of the traffic along the waterfront will run beneath the
building. To boost public transportation the new tram will have a stop here. (Schmidt)
Culture Island in Middelfart, Middelfart – Denmark 2005
Cooperating Architects: Karl C. Rosenberg Rasmussen
Client: The Municipality of Middelfart, Area: 4,500 m² , Construction sum € 8.7 million excl. VAT
Competition: 2002, 1st prize in restricted competition, Status: Construction period 2003 - 2005
Contractor: MT Højgaard
The highly sculptural quality of the new Culture Island energises the newly created peninsula extending from Middelfart’s
waterfront. The Culture Island is a multi-building accommodating a whole range of the town’s culture facilities under one roof,
including a large new library, a cinema, a panorama restaurant, a café, a tourist information office and the town’s new assembly
hall.
The Culture Island is situated on an artificial peninsula in the narrow channel between Jutland and the island of Funen. The
peninsula is floating above the water on piles deep in the sea bed, and it is surrounded by an exclusive marina. Standing on the
harbour seafront of Middelfart it is easy to understand why the town is known as the Town of Bridges. From the Culture Island
there is an impressive view of the two bridges that link Jutland with the island of Funen. The view to the west is of a fine bridge built
in 1935 that brings railway traffic over the Little Belt, and to the north can be seen an elegant suspension bridge from 1970 over
which motorway traffic crosses between the island and the mainland.
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