STUDENTS OF ARCHITECTURE LOOK 50 YEARS INTO THE FUTURE OF MIDDELFART

What will Middelfart look like in 2070? And who will live there?

04.03.2019

For three weeks, 34 students from Aarhus School of Architecture will be working with the future of Middelfart from the perspective of climate change. Their work is currently being exhibited at what was formerly ‘Pigernes’ at 5 Nytorv in Middelfart.

Wind flows, water flows, human flows and car flows. Everything is changing, and climate change is doing all it can to accelerate the pace of this transformation. But what does this mean for a Danish provincial town by the sea? The town of Middelfart already has a climate lab. But another study into the city’s future is being carried out right now.

Making visible the invisible

In the town’s old pharmacy, 34 students from Aarhus School of Architecture are busy drawing maps. How do young people move around the town? And how do wind flows move around the town? As part of a project called Middelfart Klimalaboratorium 2070 (Climate Lab Middelfart 2070) the students have constructed a physical model, which is currently on display at Pigernes, at 5 Nytorv.

‘In our work we employ a clear holistic focus because climate adaptation is about more than, for instance, energy and transportation. It also involves climate refugees, demographics and challenges about how we can to live together more closely. The students are working on making visible the invisible’, says Associate Professor Heidi Merrild from Aarhus School of Architecture.

It’s better to act based on knowledge

Part of the project is also about proposing new ways of reusing materials and waste in urban areas.

‘We want to work towards more speculative circular solutions, to improve our ability to act based on knowledge and strength rather than on the trailing edge of climate-related change and societal collapse’, says Heidi Merrild.

Engaging with the world

The exhibition at Pigernes opened Friday 28 February, but work on the cards and the work of post-processing of the material is still going on.

‘Getting in touch with the real world and citizens in this way is very productive for the students. The architecture of tomorrow should to a great extent come into being through an interaction with its surroundings or, as the School expresses it in its vision, by Engaging Through Architecture’, says Troels Rugbjerg, teaching assistant, Aarhus School of Architecture.

As mentioned, you can see the results of the students’ work at the exhibition. The results will also be part of Klimafolkemødet (the National People’s Climate Meeting), which will also be held in Middelfart from 27 to 29 August 2020. Alternatively, the inhabitants of Middelfart will just have to be very patient and see the final outcome with their own eyes in 2070.