Architects Bjarke Ingels Group have won a competition to design the Danish Pavilion for Expo 2010 in Shanghai, China.
The pavilion will incorporate 1500 bicycles for use by visitors during the Expo.
A bathing pool at the centre of the pavilion will be filled with sea water from Copenhagen harbour, shipped to Shanghai.
The Little Mermaid statue from Copenhagen harbour will be shipped to Shanghai and installed in a bathing pool at the centre of the pavilion, which will be filled with sea water also shipped from Copenhagen to Shanghai.
The 3000 square metre pavilion will be made from white, painted steel and manufactured at a Chinese shipyard.
The facade will be perforated with with a pattern that the architects claim “reflects a Danish city silhouette”.
Here’s some more information from BIG:
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The Danish pavilion should not only exhibit the Danish virtues. Through interaction, the visitors are able to actually experience some of Copenhagen’s best attractions – the city bike, the harbor bath, the nature playground and an ecological picnic.
The bike is a venacular means of transportation and a national symbol – common to Denmark and China. In recent years it had a very different fate in the two countries. While Copenhagen is striving to become the world’s leading bike city, heavy motor traffic is rising in Shanghai, where the car has become a symbol of wealth.
With the pavilion we relaunch the bike in Shanghai as a symbol of modern lifestyle and sustainable urban development. The pavilion’s 1500 city bikes are offered for general use to the visitors during EXPO 2010. After the world exhibition it can be moved and placed in i.e. Peoples Parc as a transferium for the bikes of Shanghai.
Both Shanghai and Copenhagen are harbor cities. However, the polluting activities in the harbor have been replaced by harbor parcs and cultural institutions in Denmark, and as a result the water has become clean enough to swim in. In the heart of the pavilion lies a harbor bath, which is filled up with seawater from Copenhagen harbour shipped to Shanghai in a tank vessel. The Chinese can swim in the bath and not only hear about the clean water but actually feel and taste it. The Little Mermaid is sitting in the waterline of the harbor bath exactly as she is in Copenhagen harbor. It is the original Mermaid visiting China as a concrete example of the idea that the Danish pavilion contains the real experience of the Danish city life.
While the Little Mermaid is in Shanghai, her place in Langelinie will be occupied by three trendsetting Chinese artists and their interpretation of the sculpture. The absence of the Mermaid will increase her value as an attraction for the Danes and in this period it will be possible to follow her life in Shanghai via a live transmission.
The pavilion is constructed as a monolithic self-supporting construction in white-painted steel, manufactured at a Chinese shipyard. Prefabrication will affect to an uncomplicated transportation, effective samlingsproces, rational dismantling and transfer. The synthetic light-blue coating used in Denmark for bicycle paths will cover the roof. Inside, the floor will appear in epoxy, the light-blue bicycle path respectively.
The sequence of events at the exhibition takes place between two parallel facades – the internal and external. The internal is closed and contains different functions of the pavilion. The width varies and is defined by the programme of the inner space. The external facade, pavilion’s façade outwards, is made of perforated steel that represents/reflects a Danish city silhouette. In the evening time, the indoor activity of the pavilion will be illuminated for passers-by.
CODE : XPO
PROJECT : Danish Pavilion EXPO 2010
TYPE : COMMISION
SIZE : 3.000m2
CLIENT : Erhvervs- og Byggestyrelsen
COLLABORATORS: 2+1, Arup AGU
LOCATION : Shanghai, China
STATUS : Ongoing
Partner-in-Charge: Bjarke Ingels
Project Architect: Niels Lund Petersen
Project team: Jan Magasanik, Kamil Szoltysek, Sonja Reisinger
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Posted by Rose Etherington
September 25th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
I like it. Nice curves.
September 25th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
ahora tendremos que soportar a BIG quien sabe por cuanto tiempo
September 25th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
NICE GEOMETRY.
CLEVER AND AESTHETIC.
TOTALLY BIG.
LOVE IT.
September 25th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
wow
looks so interessant !
go BIG go !
September 25th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
amazing!
September 25th, 2008 at 4:44 pm
totally gorgeous~!
September 25th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
I like it.
It reminds me of the Merc Museum by UN Studio.
September 25th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
BIG is getting big
September 25th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
The diagrams toward the bottom of the post are invaluable to understanding the designers thoughts. Bravo, nice project!
September 25th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
these guys.. they have some exceptional skills in persuasion.
I don’t know if this just too pop to be poop!!!
September 25th, 2008 at 6:11 pm
again one of Big’s one-liners.
zero complexity. blunt!
blue-foam architecture.
September 25th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
elegant…..!simply like it..!!!
September 25th, 2008 at 7:04 pm
very danish!
September 25th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Why does the night time mock-up have the Toronto skyline in the background? You can clearly see the base of the CN Tower plus the BMO and Scotiabank buildings.
September 25th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
They have caught the spirit of Expo and I love it.
Well done BIG!!!
September 25th, 2008 at 11:05 pm
The skyline in the rendering is Toronto
September 26th, 2008 at 3:05 am
another mobius ring, but simple and clear, I like it.
September 26th, 2008 at 5:19 am
smart….
September 26th, 2008 at 6:37 am
Great Dear!! amazing…
September 26th, 2008 at 8:37 am
so NOT new; so seen before
September 26th, 2008 at 9:25 am
Great looking pavilion, I love especially where the building floats and fly above my head and comes back to the ground! Fantastic facade materialisation as well. Hope the exhibition itself will be great as well. This said, I am not convinced with the way interior is arranged with walls and boxes! More fuid circuler system? Never the less Congrat!
September 26th, 2008 at 9:29 am
mmm nice.. at least this pathway has something to do up there.. unlike the one in london..which was just a wood, painted black walkway to nowehere really..
September 26th, 2008 at 10:01 am
beau projet
September 26th, 2008 at 10:40 am
This is kid’s architecture man. I think i will quit my job and start an office too! It’s can be so easy and why did i ever graduate?
September 26th, 2008 at 11:02 am
I love their relaxed way of doing architecture. Come on, just go BIG.
September 26th, 2008 at 11:43 am
For me the most interesting part is the real Danish mermaid statue.
A very brave and unpreceeded idea!
At the same time i’m not sure that the water transportation from Denmark is really worth the effort.
September 26th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Brilliant concept,,
September 26th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
TAKE A LOOK TO CAMPO BAEZA’S MERCEDES BENZ MUSEUM IN GERMANY. TOOOOO SIMILAR, I THINK
September 26th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
Nice, very elegant and usefull!
September 26th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
love it!
September 26th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
I will pray for the water/marmaid cargo……… how can they do it? is it the original marmaid? you are CRAAAAAZY GUYS !!!! but i adore big studio
September 26th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
big is the best…I love this way of doing architecture. Makes it more fun and interesting
September 27th, 2008 at 2:06 am
typical BIG… i like it!
September 27th, 2008 at 7:12 am
when the the building will be builded?EXPO is coming soon.then where will it is?perfect design!
September 28th, 2008 at 9:02 am
“Campo Baeza’s Mercedes Museum”? I believe you mean UNStudio’s Mercedes Museum (practically the opposite end of the design sensibility spectrum)…
September 29th, 2008 at 12:50 am
that’s brainwork…i like it!
September 29th, 2008 at 8:04 am
vortekxt: google campo baeza + mercedes
September 29th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Wow….imported sea water from Copenhagen. Talk about being true to yourself!! I like it and I like it BIG!
September 29th, 2008 at 10:59 am
Oha. Didn’t know of the Baeza-project either. Though the comparison to this pavillion is as far-fetched as that to UN Studio’s actual museum… museum circuits ending where they started aren’t that new, are they?
Even though I may like the ideas more than the building itself, it still is interesting.
September 29th, 2008 at 11:40 pm
Elegant, simple, superb. I have to hand it to BIG.
September 30th, 2008 at 2:09 am
Andersen’s mermaid has two flippers, right?
October 4th, 2008 at 11:53 pm
It’s fun and the bike idea is extra fun… but the facade pattern is a bit hokey.
BIG is better at making pavilions than ‘real’ buildings, because the one-liner approach is totally ok for pavilions!
April 9th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
it’s a very logical explanation, i lke it, the ‘content’ seems melted with the context of the chinnese familiarity (bikers)
nice, good job!
April 16th, 2009 at 3:51 am
i want to see this!
April 18th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Nothing Danish there at all…