Tag Archives: harbour

Sønderborg’s new multicultural centre on the harbour

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sonderborg multicultural house

One of the key buildings in Frank Gehry’s Masterplan for Sønderborg is the multicultural centre that will sit at a prominent location in Sonderborg with views of both the harbour and the historical city centre.

There were two architect companies that took part in the contest to design the future centre. It has now been decided by the municipality which submission is the winning bid. And from the pictures published I think it looks like a really nice project.

The winning proposal for the new multicultural centre on the waterfront is created in collaboration between AART Architects, Zeni Architects, Alectia and Hoffmann.

Sonderborg havnefront

The centre will be built around the old warehouse (Ewers pakhus) that is the only old building left on the harbour at the moment.

The lonely warehouse on the harbour

The warehouse in is a pretty bad state but I think that once it has been restored it will add character and charm to the brand new building and be a physical reminder of the times where the harbour of Sonderborg was a bustling industrial port.

The building will bring together under one roof several cultural institutions, and create a place where the focus is on learning as well as other cultural and recreational activities. The building will amongst other things house Sønderborg Library, The German Library and South Jutlands Artschool.

sonderborg library

The building will be 5500m2 and it is expected that 1000 people will use the building daily and the budget cost of the centre is almost 100 million kroner.

sonderborg cafe library

House of Knowledge – TeleBilling, KPMG & Rambøll

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On the harbour of Sønderborg a new building is rapidly taking shape. It’s another of the pieces from Frank Gehry’s Masterplan for the harbour front of Sønderborg. The plan is to transform the harbour into a vibrant new part of town.

Sønderborg Videnshus / House of Knowledge

The first block was the white residential building (to the right in the picture above) – this time it’s a bronze “House of Knowledge” – Videnshus in Danish – (to the left). The building will be the new corporate residence for local IT company TeleBilling, the local branch of KPMG accounting and Rambøll engineering.

house of knowledge

Recently TeleBilling made a film of what the building looks like now as they are still working on the interior. (Skip to 0:23)

The offices there will have amazing views up and down Alssund and you couldn’t blame the office workers for sometimes stopping what they are doing to stare at the beautiful scenery.

interior house of knowledge

The building has 6 floors and 4750 square meters of office space. The roof will be fitted with solar panels and will comply with the 2020 standard of buildings, which means it’s very energy efficient.

If everything goes according to plan the three residents should be moving in in November. Let’s hope they have an open house reception, so the rest of us can come in and be jealous of their sparkling new office.

Read more at Byens Havn

Events south of the Border

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Every month we look at what is going on on this side of the Danish-German border. However, as well explained by the Sonderborg 2017 European Capital of Culture bid, there is a commonality between the two regions, and a need for all of us to work together if we want to succeed. So we decided to take a peek at some of the major events going on south of the border in August.

A good source of information for events going on in Schleswig-Holstein is the region’s own webpage. Although the website also has an English translation, we couldn’t find the events calendar in English. However, there are ample tools out there to help you translate the text and held you decided which events you want to travel for. This is what caught our eye:

Husum Harbour Days: Starting today, Husum is celebrating its connection to the sea with 5 days of activities around the harbour.

Busum kutterregatta: More sea-connected activities as shrimp boats compete for the ‘Blaue Band’ in this 2-day regatta (4-5 August)

Gottorf Castle celebrated its gardnes , especially the newly restored baroque ones on the 11th of August

Flensburg Nautics: Enjoy tall ships, gaff ships and yachts just across the border on the 17-19 August.

Lubeck Museum Night: Enjoy late night museum opening on the 25th of August (just after Sonderborg’s Culture night on the 24th)

So if you haven’t ventured south of the border during these holidays, what are your waiting for?

Stroll along Sonderborg Havn

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Sonderborg Havn (Harbour) is a major feature of the town of Sonderborg. It comes alive especially in the summer months when the weather entices the people in town to enjoy the relaxed atmosphere along the water. If you are looking for something more than some relaxation, this is a bit of what you can see along the water.

Sonderborg Castle

Sonderborg castle is the dominating feature of the south end of Sonderborg Harbour. It has been around since the 12th, protecting Jutland from attacks from the south. A visit to the castle is a good way of learning a bit more about the history of the area (though not all displays are translated into English). (#2/99 of Things to do in Sonderborg)

Fru Jensen

Every afternoon you can buy fish straight off the Fru Jensen fishing boat moored besides Sonderborg slot. (#5/99 of Things to do in Sonderborg).

The Legend of King Christian’s Table

The legend goes that while Christian the 2nd was imprisoned in the castle, he continuously walked round a table dragging a finger around its edge. Over time, a groove to form in the table top as a result of the constant rubbing along the edge. Although the story is simply a legend, you can see a statue called “The Myth” representing this along the harbour.

Ringrider Track

The ringrider tradition is a popular tradition in southern Jutland. You can see an old ringrider track at the side of Sonderborg castle.

Ringrider Monument

With Sonderborg having the biggest ringrider festival in Denmark, it is apt that a monument to this tradition is placed in such a central location.

Old Castle Wall

If you looked at the models of the castle in the first display cases in Sonderborg Castle you may have noticed that the castle was originally on an island, surrounded by thick walls with towers at the corners. You can still see remnants of a tower here, as well as bits and pieces of the wall on the other side.

Der Butt im Griff

The “Flounder in control” is a sculpture by 1999 Nobel Prize recipient in Literature, Gunter Grass. This 2.3m high bronze sculpture was opened in 2004. The same sculpture can also be seen in Lubeck and Dusseldorf.

Restaurants

There are 5 restaurants just across from the harbour where you can savour a wide variety of food, from Argentinian and Asian to Danish, fish and beef.

Ice-Cream Kiosk

Having walked this far around the harbour you deserve a treat. And what better place to get it than at the ice-cream kiosk just on the water front. If ice-cream is not your thing you can also get a beer and relax on the benches and tables right next to the kiosk.

Train Tracks

Nowadays, the train stops at Alsion, on the Jutland side of Sonderborg. However, the train used to cross the King Christian bridge from Jutland onto Als. Evidence can still be seen close to the harbour, where there are still remnants of the train tracks left embedded in the road.

The First Block in Gehry’s Masterplan

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The architect Frank Gehry and his company created a Masterplan for the harbour in Sonderborg back in 2008. The masterplan was a rough sketch of how the urban landscape along the water across from Alsion could be shaped.

Instead of making specific designs for the buildings Gehry’s plan just had big blocks representing buildings as you can see above and below.

As far as I can tell the building in question is going to be the black buildings on the right on the picture below. It should be in front of the hospital a bit up the hill. (Residential C on this map)

The first building to become more concrete than a big wooden block is designed by Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG). I don’t know the actual name of the house but it looks a bit like a sliced and twisted shoebox. On BIG’s website is a presentation of the house with this description:

How do you create dwellings that optimize the water and the view to the fullest?

[…] BIG’s project, Sønderborg, is a new 1,100 m2 residential building located on the northern side of the harbourfront close to the existing Sønderjylland Hospital.

From the water the building is viewed as a sculpture that rest on a soft hill and invites the viewer to explore the different angles of the architecture. From the other side the building is views as a series of volumes that twists and rises from the park creating an open but yet protected arrival space.

The building consists of 7 exclusive apartments with private terraces that extend the life inside the building to the outside in the warmer months. The terraces have a covered and uncovered area so they can be used even during rainy days.

To archive a better connection between the park where the building is placed, we have lowered the basement half below ground while the other half of the basements is covered by a soft hill. This means that you need to descent half a floor in order to get inside the apartments. This gesture means that the two lower terraces archive more privacy than if they were placed directly on the existing terrain.

–Bjarke Ingels Group

I think it’s a cool and bold building and the views will be spectacular. The sidings on the artists renditions are bright rusted orange, I wonder how that will look in real life.

The building is also set in the middle of a public landscape so unless you are at the top people can peak into your house from almost all sides.

It will be interesting to follow the construction and final finish of this building.

Photos in this post are from Byens Havn, Gehry’s masterplan Design Guide and BIG’s project description. I discovered the project on afasia.

Sonderborg: A Cruise Destination

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As the tag line to this blog says, Sonderborg is a ‘town on an island’, so as you can guess there is a lot of water-related activity. When I was in Sonderborg earlier in summer I could easily realise that kayaking, sailing, fishing and other similar activities are a big thing in the area.

What I didn’t realise, however, was that Sonderborg is also being advertised as a cruise destination. This helps reinforce my idea of Sonderborg as an aspirational city and helps calm my qualms about moving to a a smaller city after having gotten used to the excesses of London.

The video is made by Avid Cruiser a specialist in reviewing ports and cruises. Apart from the video above Avid Cruiser also has a comprehensive run down of things to do in and around Sønderborg and how to dock there which is probably useful for boaters. Maybe he is commissioned by the city to create the video to explain what it has to offer to potential tour operators and cruise guests. I’m not sure, but it’s a great introduction to Sønderborg.