In the city of Odense in Denmark in the very center of the city at the intersection of two streets there is a small yellow house - the house-museum of Hans Christian Andersen, where the great storyteller was born in 1805. In the 60s of the XX century, most of the buildings of the historical quarter, in which this museum is located, was destroyed, and in its place a 4-lane road with tram tracks appeared. In 1997, the Ognivo Children's Cultural Center was built next to the museum.
Today, visitors to the Museum and the Children's Center experience a number of inconveniences associated with the nearby highway: from noise pollution to air pollution. In addition, navigation is poorly developed in the area, so it is not easy for tourists and townspeople to find both the house-museum and the Ognivo.
Fortunately, big changes await Odense soon: the government is launching a major urban development project, within the framework of which they plan to relocate the high-speed tram tracks, build many residential buildings, a concert hall and a theater. It is possible that the area of the Hans Christian Andersen house-museum will also be affected by these positive changes. The purpose of the competition of ideas was precisely the search for possible concepts for the development of the Andersen Museum and its transformation into a large-scale complex with a garden for tourists and city residents - the so-called "House of Fairy Tales", in which visitors could plunge into the atmosphere of the incredible world created by the writer in his books … Participants in their projects needed to preserve the house in which the writer was born, lived and worked, as well as several nearby mansions. In the future, on the basis of this competition of ideas, it is planned to organize another competition - this time with the aim of implementing the winning project.
The first place in the competition was taken by three participants at once: our compatriot Rodion Kitaev, a famous illustrator who worked with such publications as Bolshoi Gorod, The Prime Russian Magazine, Around the World, Secret of the Firm [now he is the head of the Kosmos Bureau, which recently received an honorable mention with the same composition for a competitive project for the improvement of Triumfalnaya Square]; Leith Kerr from the UK and the Norwegian bureau Transborder Studio. We present the works of the winners of the competition, the project that took second place, as well as the concepts that received special prizes.
1st place. Rodion Kitaev
Tower and labyrinth
The House of Fairy Tales consists of four main elements: a tower, a labyrinth, a garden and Andersen's house-museum. The tower is the main component of the composition of the Cultural Center, both in terms of dominance in the surrounding buildings (its height is 50 meters) and in the ideological aspect: the clearly delineated silhouette of the tower symbolizes the development and aspiration for the future, and the shell, imitating the traditional half-timbered architecture for local architecture construction - a connection with the past. The tower is planned to house a hotel, library and cafe.
The labyrinth is a space located below ground level that houses exhibition spaces of various geometric shapes, storage and parking. According to the author's plan, the labyrinth should excite the senses of visitors: different materials will be used in the exhibition spaces, the level of illumination, acoustic effects and temperature - all this will contribute to creating a fabulous atmosphere.
The garden will become the unifying element for all components of the project.
1st place. Leith Kerr
Paper house
The idea of this Complex is very simple - the archetype is used as a basis: a laconic gable volume with the most ordinary windows and doors. However, the impression he makes is quite fabulous: as if the walls and roof of the house were cut out of a snow-white sheet of paper.
There is a pool-lake in front of the Center. The main exhibition spaces are "hidden" under the ground.
1st place. Transborder Studio
Hortus Conclusus Andersen
Hortus Conclusus is Latin for “Locked Garden”. As the name implies, the museum complex is a "fairytale" garden of pentagonal shape, along the perimeter of which the museum premises are located. It is planned that there will be not only exhibition spaces, but also a research center dedicated to the work of Hans Christian Andersen.
2nd place. Norell / Rodhe Arkitektur
One garden - seven characters
Architects from the Swedish bureau proposed an option in which, in addition to the writer's house and the Memorial Hall behind it, there will be 7 pavilion houses on the territory of the garden, comparable to the buildings of Andersen's time. Most of these pavilions are connected to each other by large underground spaces.
Honorable Mentions
Soriano & Asociados arquitectos
This work, like Leith Kerr's winning first place proposal, refers to another passion of Hans Christian Andersen - cutting out silhouettes from paper. The idea is expressed primarily in the planning structure of the garden and the underground level: as if the figures of the characters of the writer's fairy tales became components of the plan.
Peter sand
The author lowers the main volume of the Cultural Center to the level of the underground and basement floors. And the entire surface area is set aside for a multi-level garden. The jury considered that, for all its merits, the project has one significant drawback - insufficient “fabulousness”.
BFarchitecture Bureau
The museum complex consists of 10 multifunctional surreal towers, the silhouette of which was obtained by transforming a traditional house with a gable roof. As in many other projects, here the museum squares have been removed to the underground floor. The facade of the towers is decorated with Anderson's "paper" ornaments.
Magdalena Jagoda, Katarzyna Kokot
The House of Hans Christian Andersen and the Memorial Hall behind it unite under the roof of an aboveground pavilion, from which visitors enter the underground museum spaces. The garden houses a kind of craters - windows at ground level, illuminating the museum premises below.
Studio weave
The authors propose to place 13 small buildings with various functions on the territory of the museum complex: cafes, galleries, art workshops. Stylistically, these buildings will resemble the houses of Andersen's times and create a truly magical atmosphere. Cozy public spaces will be created between the houses.
Panni Bodonyi
The territory of the magic garden is a set of green circles of different diameters, located at different levels. Also in the garden there are several cylinders - "lakes" with glass walls. One of these cylinders serves as the entrance to the museum.
