Hans Christian Andersen House of Fairytales

Project description

Hans Christian Andersen House of Fairytales features a series of cylindrical volumes with glass and latticed timber facades and scooped green roofs.

The cylinders are placed close to the existing buildings near the poet’s birthplace and memorial hall.

The visitors experience a building which is focused on the fairytales. The building is created in multiple levels with most of the building placed below ground level. The rooms are going to switch between up/down and indoor/outdoor.

By lowering most of the exhibition below ground level space is created for a fairytale garden which is going to combine the places various levels.

The inspiration for the new building originates in the poet’s birthplace and surrounding village houses. A new interpretation of the timber frame tradition is expressed by using massive timber with glass fillings which give a light expression like a pavilion in the garden.

The building is characterized by the curved shapes, which are repeated in constructions, ramps, stairs, the dynamic inserted deck, and circular timbering in the terrain. From an engineer’s point of view where the most interesting stuff happens is in the roof deck.

The roof deck is faceted with more than 100 unique triangular discs, assembled into a dynamic whole, supported by reinforced concrete columns with height differences between 3 and 9 m.

The project made significant interesting demands on the constructive imagination to fulfill the architect's intentions.

The architecture competition was won in 2016 by international renowned Kengo Kuma and the project is carried out in a close corporation with the architect Yuki Ikeguchi, partner in Kengo Kuma & Associates.

The museum and experience center has been nominated for the EU Mies Award 2024 and has won the Architecture Award in the municipality of Odense connected to globally celebrated World Architecture Day.

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