DEPARTURES TRAVEL URBAN PRIMER 16 Aarhus, Denmark A city of architectural might thrives outside the spotlight. COPENHAGEN IS sometimes called the Venice of the North, thanks to its cosy charm and canals – but like Venice, the city can feel like a victim of its own success, with nearly a million cruise passengers visiting last year, in addition to fleets of EasyJets and Ryanairs delivering cool hunters. For those looking for a more leisurely urban experience, the trick may be to check out Europe’s 2017 Capital of Culture: Aarhus. Like an ingeniously designed piece of furniture, Aarhus is both young and old, industrious and easygoing – a compact, almost petite city just minutes from dense forests and empty beaches. As much as any city in Scandinavia, Aarhus is intensely maritime in character, with the busiest container port in Denmark. The city’s name is derived from ár-óss (pronounced AW-hooce), which means “river mouth” in Old Norse, the language of the Vikings, whose ninth-century settlements in the area predate Copenhagen’s founding by 300 years. Yet it is also home to Aarhus University, Scandinavia’s largest institution of higher learning, balancing the heavy industry with a decidedly bohemian vibe. Aarhus is a city dedicated to the art of hanging out, with much activity taking place along the restored harbour area, whose redevelopment started with the Isbjerget, a spectacular residential complex in the old docklands. Built in 2013, the Isbjerget resembles, well, an iceberg, with its craggy roofline and blue-white exterior. Nearby, the Harbour Bath (visitaarhus.com), designed by Bjarke Ingels, is the city’s latest architectural draw, holding up to 650 people (free of charge) in its trio of pools – one for lap swimmers, one for divers and one for children. Said to be the largest seawater-fed bath in the world, the stadiumsized complex is surrounded by an elliptical wooden walkway where nonswimmers can enjoy an ice cream or natural champagne from one of the nearby food stalls. Almost as Instagrammable as semiclothed Danes lazing on a giant public work of art is the ARoS Aarhus Art Museum (aros.dk), whose prismatic circular skywalk, designed by Olafur Eliasson, looms over the city. A stroll inside the skywalk feels like stepping inside a rainbow, with the Kattegat bay in the distance. The museum itself houses a stunning permanent collection of contemporary art, with pieces by James Turrell and Shirin Neshat. Not far, the four-year-old Comwell Hotel ( comwellaarhus. dk), features panoramic views and interiors by design house Hay. Aarhus definitely has something going on with circles. Ten minutes from the city centre, on Ballehage Beach, stands the Infinite Bridge, a 360-degree wooden walkway that creates Previous page, top row, from left: the skywalk at the ARoS Aarhus Museum; the Gothenburg Art Museum; design shop NR4, in Aarhus; centre row, from left: Aarhus’s Infinite Bridge; cod with salmon roe and boiled potatoes at Tullhuset, in Gothenburg; a waiter at Cornelius, in Bergen; bottom row, from left: the Volvo Museum in Gothenburg; furniture designer Philipp von Hase in his Bergen studio; inside Hoggorm pizza bar, Bergen Left: Salling Tower by architect Dorte Mandrup, in Aarhus; below: beer cans at Mikkeller Bar, in Aarhus awareness of the relationship between the city and majestic Bay of Aarhus as you navigate its perimeter. The pebbled beach beneath is a favourite hangout for picnicking couples. Proximity to beach and forest is very much part of Aarhus’s identity. Chefs like Rune Lund Sørensen, co-owner of Hærværk ( restauranthaervaerk.dk), a no-frills restaurant where dishes change according to season and supply, love being able to duck out to forage for wild herbs or mushrooms and be back in their kitchens an hour later. Also serving a seasonally ordered menu, Michelin-starred Domestic ( restaurantdomestic.dk) hides in a quiet courtyard of the Latin Quarter, its warm, pared-down interior packed with jars containing the fermented delicacies the restaurant specialises in. Not unlike Aarhus itself, Domestic finds ways to unite seemingly unlikely pairings of simple ingredients: pork and unripe plums, flounder with gooseberries and cucumber, mackerel and strawberries.
Bergen, Norway A port town steeped in history marches to its own beat. The view from the neighbourhood of Skuteviken, in Bergen’s centre HOGGORM, A PIZZA BAR in Bergen, is named after Norway’s only venomous snake, the European viper. Like Bergen itself, “he’s rock star, but not too rock star,” says owner Annette Tveit. “Really, I just like having a viper coiled around a slice of pizza on our logo.” Tveit’s boyfriend, Christopher Haatuft, is the chef-owner of Lysverket (lysverket.no), a block away. With a résumé that includes Blue Hill at Stone Barns and Per Se, Haatuft is the poster boy for Bergen’s culinary ambitions. Scandinavia’s penchant for all things fresh and foraged has finally reached western Norway; here they call it New Fjordic. Haatuft taps into his network of purveyors, including a rancher who raises free-range boar. Lysverket is a laboratory where he plays, and although he never intended it to be so tourist-facing, it’s become a necessary stop for those not only interested in the region’s compelling landscape but its culinary bounty as well. You could say the same about Bergen. Once a bustling trading hub for the Hanseatic League, the city was never particularly poised to be a tourism show pony – especially with its 230 days of annual downpour – but its undeniable merits (namely a dramatically sited urban core that inspired the setting for Disney’s Frozen) have turned it into the official jumping-off point for the country’s trademark fjords. With fewer than 300,000 people, Bergen, founded on a Viking settlement in the year 1070, is perhaps the world’s only second city without an inferiority complex, garnering as DISTANT REDOUBTS 17 DEPARTURES
