In January 2020, US News & World Report and the Wharton School of Pennsylvania jointly released a "Best Countries Report." According to the report, Denmark ranks among the top of the list of "the best countries in the world to raise children". In Denmark, the capital, Copenhagen, is the city that is best suited for families with children. What makes Copenhagen so attractive? Perhaps we can find the answer in the Danish Architecture Centre's new exhibition Kids' City, launched in 2020.
Exhibition of the Danish Architecture Centre and the Children's City
Danish Architecture Center Kids’ City
The Danish Architecture Centre (DAC) is located in the heart of Copenhagen near the Inner Harbour, an iconic building designed by Koolhaas and taken into the concept of a "city within a city". DAC is an international cultural centre and a danish forum for architecture, design and urban culture. It invites children and adults, locals and tourists, architecture enthusiasts and intellectuals to come and be inspired by new perspectives on architecture and the way of life it leads.
This excellent building is for the majority, not for the few, so everyone can find their own space in the DAC. Through exhibitions, visits, events, learning and networking, DAC creates a unique venue for inspiration, enjoyment and immersion. Among them, the Kids' City Children's City exhibition, launched in 2020, opens the door for young visitors to explore the city, its architecture and the way of life it brings. Countless families come here with their children to start their "first lesson" about cities and architecture – a city for Children is a city for Everyone A child-friendly city is also a city friendly to all.
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A highly refined miniature city
The Children's City is based on the city of Copenhagen, extracting several of its typical child-friendly elements such as the vast nature, the pedestrian-friendly bicycle transportation system, the fun children's daycare building, the perfect children's health care and medical facilities, the creative representative building, etc. DaC works with several renowned Danish architects to bring cutting-edge and diverse architectural ideas to the exhibition with a child-centred approach, encouraging every young visitor to observe and explore the city, architecture and construction in their own way.
Several themes and units of the exhibition are organically combined to become the most miniature urban system in the DAC City. Among them, natural elements such as clouds, native Danish trees are abstracted into flat images, suspended or scattered in the exhibition hall; rain curtains become interactive lightweight installations in the venue; wooden forest rat slides made of indigenous wood are full of the unique romance of fairy tale countries.
BIG, COBE and Adept, which have made great achievements in their respective fields, provided the exhibition with their own children's architecture science play installations such as: miniature version of the cophill slide, children's daycare tree houses of different scales, exposed frames and divided building climbing structures, and stacked high blocks abstracted from Camp Advanture's tower.
Around these children's versions of the "master building" is Copenhagen's most iconic bike lane system – a city where even children aged 5 or 6 can safely cycle through the city. The exhibition wall visual belt along the bike path in the exhibition hall showed the adults accompanying the children the buildings, installations, and ideas behind the architecture and design studios such as COBE, 3XN, EFFEKT, ADEPT, BIG Architects, Dissing+Weitling and MONSTRUM.
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A city of fun games with the senses
This miniature children's city offers a unique experience for everyone who arrives, and of course it's a city of fun for those who are curious and fun. In addition to the popular science of culture and architecture, each exhibition installation is also combined with the most popular play experience for children to create edutainment and sensory interactive content.
Kids can enter the white ocean ball pool from the big blue cophill slide; they can also enter the body of the forest rat and slide down the big slide on their backs; they can walk through the rain curtain, play and hide and seek; and they can listen to the sounds of the city through headphones and try to guess where they come from...
The 11 children's daycare treehouse buildings show the process of gradually enlarging from the scale of children's toys to the scale of normal urban children's architecture, children can interact with these different scales of space to find the most suitable scale for their body; and their parents can also enter these treehouses and get empathy from the perspective of children in small spaces or on giant furniture - when children are still young, our cities, buildings, and even furniture are too large in their eyes;
A sloping hut hidden in the middle shows children the magic of the visual upside-down world, and those adults who are childlike and keen to punch cards are invited to join the children's ranks;
The building structure climbing device provides a special experience of exploring in an "unbuilt" structure, he integrates the three-dimensional climbing structure, rope net tunnel, multi-layer maze, unit shelter and other children's favorite game elements into the classic architectural framework structure, in which children walk through and play, but also complete a personal experience of the space in the building and the logic of construction;
In addition to the rainbow-like gradients, the miniature bike lanes that lead around the venue are also particularly "naughty", and the local "restless" serpentine jitter creates a sprint challenge that makes children excited, and also represents Copenhagen's unique cross-river bicycle bridge, and the bottom of these arch arcs has also become a "hiding place" for children to play or rest.
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A city of freedom and open creation
In addition to the edutainment and educational game experience, the Children's City is also an open "building workshop" that can be freely created by children. Any idea of the city and architecture can be drawn here through pen and paper, Lego construction, and these young ideas will eventually be collected by the organizers as a valuable basis for Copenhagen to improve the quality of the child-friendly city; older children can also enter the Minecraft user terminal with friends to try to build the coolest virtual city.
Small elements such as abstract trees, small tree houses, furniture and bonsai can be freely transported and combined by children, placed in their favorite places, and created their own unique urban or architectural landscapes.
In the urban light installation, young tourists can experiment with different combinations of lighting and materials to bring different emotions to the miniature buildings, streets, parks and other urban public spaces, thus creating different places.
In front of the abstract urban canvas, the children's body movements will be captured by the somatosensory camera, interacting and merging with the image, and the participants will intuitively see the impact of their actions on the city...
All of this is centered around the big theme of "Child-centred architecture and construction", which on the one hand focuses on how Copenhagen has become one of the most child-friendly places in the world, distilling its key child-friendly elements; on the other hand, the children's city combines the elements of urban and architectural design that were previously considered abstract and advanced with a variety of children's play styles, and children visiting the "Children's City" will find interesting games and learning on their own level. And open participation creates opportunities; the adults who accompany them will be invited to participate in the game to the greatest extent possible, or to learn more about the ideas and future presentations behind the latest Danish children's buildings while accompanying and waiting for children.
In this sense, the Children's City at the Centre of Architecture in Denmark is a miniature city for children, a fun architectural playground, and a microcosm of an inclusive and balanced city that can accommodate everyone, after all, A City for Children is a City for Everyone – a child-friendly city is also a city friendly to all!