Henning Larsen Architects aimed to set a benchmark for green design with this university building in Kolding, Denmark, featuring a climate-responsive kinetic facade and a triangular form .
Found just off the harbour in Kolding, the Syddansk Universitet communications and design developing has a distinctive isosceles triangular form that creates a extremely noticeable new presence for the Danish university.
According to the architects, the developing is also the initial to meet the stringent energy targets of Denmark’s 2015 building codes.
Photograph by Jens Lindhe
The triangular motif of the facade’s perforated metal sunshade, which involves 1,600 panels in total, is a reference to the kind of the building.
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Sensors check heat and light amounts close to the constructing, making it possible for the facade panels to shift from open to half-open to fully open. Even when entirely closed, a managed sum of natural light is capable to shine through a custom pattern of round holes, some of which are linked to produce amoeba-like openings.
“The triangular shape was generated by the site,” stated Louis Becker, layout director at Henning Larsen, which won the Mies van der Rohe Prize in 2013 for the Harper Concert Hall in Reykjavik.
“We wanted to leave space for outside public space, and to consider benefit of the close by Kolding River.”
Photograph by Jens Lindhe
“The rotated place of the developing creates a sunny central plaza among the campus and the river, and prevents a direct north-dealing with facade with no sunlight,” he extra.
“It turned out that the triangle was a great shape to use for the interior, also.”
Photograph by Jens Lindhe
Key spaces inside the 13,700-square-metre constructing – including the atrium and a lecture theatre – function triangular plans.
Concrete slabs are left exposed to consider benefit of thermal heat obtain. The ventilation program is integrated into the ceiling planes, rather than by means of traditional ducts, which lower the two power and construction charges.
Efficient LED lighting is utilized all through, while photovoltaics and solar-heating panels drastically minimize the quantity of vitality taken from the grid.
“The vitality demand is decreased by 50 per cent compared to comparable buildings of the identical typology in Denmark by way of passive design and style measures and the implementation of efficient and intelligent techniques,” Becker explained.
“It must be mentioned that the vitality demands in Denmark are amongst the most stringent in the globe.”
The skylight-topped central atrium is criss-crossed with stairs and catwalks. At evening, when the constructing is lit from inside of, it appears far far more transparent than it does in the course of the day, making a visual connection from outdoors to the inner workings of the school.
Photograph by Jens Lindhe
Numerous of the classrooms and meeting places have clear glass walls to maximise transparency and are fitted with curtains to supply flexibility and privacy as essential.
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Open bench desks line the atrium railings, allowing for informal meetings. Quieter areas are positioned along the exterior facades. The firm custom made several of the school’s furnishings which includes triangular tables and semi-enclosed round sofa workstations.
Photograph by Jens Lindhe
“The university needed to create an energetic, neighborhood-oriented university of the long term, and to increase interaction among professors, researchers and college students,” Becker explained.
“Locations for quiet review had been required as well. We placed glass-enclosed offices along the periphery, fronted by far more social balconies. Smaller sized groups can convene in circular pods.”
Photograph by Jens Lindhe
The task contains internet site-certain art by Tobias Rehberger on the theme of “time” – such as clocks, lines and circles embedded in the walls and ceilings of coloured LEDs that modify all through the day. Rehberger also coloured some of the exterior panels, producing a quilt pattern on a portion of the facade.
The constructing homes communications, layout, linguistics, and culture courses, which are aligned with the current Worldwide Business College of Kolding and the Kolding Layout College.
Photography is by Martin Schubert, unless specified otherwise.
Site plan 
Ground floor plan 
Very first floor prepare 
Second floor plan 
Fourth floor plan 
Part Dezeen
