2018 has been a transformative year at Danish architectural firm Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects. From an international merger with Perkins+Will to the expansion of the partner group, the company has become a stronger, more formidable international player while maintaining its rich heritage and commitment to the highest level of design. The company looks back at six major project openings this year and reveals its most anticipated project of 2019.
Projects completed in 2018
Schmidt Hammer Lassen has seen a number of projects open this year:
- The firm’s first U.S. projects, Monroe Blocks, is a mix of modern office space, residential units, restaurants, retail, and outdoor public areas that will stitch together the heart of one of America’s most storied cities. Located on the northeast corner of Detroit, Michigan’s popular Campus Martius Park, the 12,500-square-metre site has lain vacant for a generation until now. The project spans two city blocks and includes the first high-rise office tower to be built downtown in more than 25 years, as well as 4,800-square-metres of public outdoor space. The master plan reintroduces historic alleyways and public access points, while prioritizing the public realm by connecting the outdoors with each structure’s ground floor. The Monroe Blocks scheme aims to connect the surrounding downtown districts, restore density and a variety of uses to the heart of downtown with iconic design, and create new vibrant public spaces with retail, food, and entertainment for a diverse mix of residents and visitors.
- Christchurch, New Zealand made international headlines when earthquakes badly damaged the city in 2010 and 2011. The new central library, Tūranga, is one of the first public buildings to open downtown since then, making it a symbol of a rebirth for the city. The journey to the opening of the new Christchurch Central Library is a rich story layered with local culture, innovative engineering, and beautiful architecture. Schmidt Hammer Lassen worked in close collaboration with the indigenous Māori people of New Zealand’s South Island, which is reflected throughout the design. Designed in collaboration with local firm Architectus, the new central library project is one of nine anchor projects identified by the city council as vital to the redevelopment of the city centre.
- In September, the new 22,310-square-metre educational facility for HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht in The Netherlands opened its doors. It houses eight educational institutes as well as university facilities, and is the last of five new buildings to complete the Kasbah masterplan. Located on the campus amongst buildings designed by OMA, UN Studio, Wiel Arets and Mecanoo, the compact, eight-floor building blurs physical boundaries while cutting a striking figure with bold, graphic lines.
- State Library Victoria, a historic Australian landmark in Melbourne, recently unveiled new spaces designed by Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects that are part of a five-year redevelopment plan aimed at expanding the library’s relevance in the community and enhancing the visitor experience among other goals. The library comprises 23 individual buildings and occupies an entire city block in Melbourne’s city centre. The architects were tasked with enriching key areas of the library by enhancing permeability and wayfinding, restoring original details, facilitating flexible use of spaces to suit evolving needs of the library, and improving the buildings’ operational efficiency.
- NIO House is electric car company NIO’s unconventional take on the automotive showroom. Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects designed two NIO House locations in China – one in Shanghai’s high-end Taikoo Hui shopping mall and one in Hangzhou overlooking the West Lake, a UNESCO world heritage site that is one of the most beautiful sights in the country. For NIO’s first flagship store in Hangzhou, the sky over West Lake is applied to the upper levels of the building as a mirrored glass façade. The full wall of windows displaying NIO’s newest car models inside draw in passers-by with its open, inviting quality. Through simple use of tactile materials such as Douglas fir, satin stainless steel, terrazzo and fabrics, the space intends to pose a question to the user: Can we make the car an extension of the home?
- Farther north in Beijing’s busy Chaoyang District, Vanke Times Center opened as a new creative urban complex that blends retail shops and offices with grand art installations, a multi-functional exhibition space, and a bamboo meditation garden. Vanke, one of the country’s largest residential property developers, commissioned Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects for its first complete renovation project — the revitalization of a former shopping mall into a vibrant hub for the city. Now complete, Vanke Times Center is home to a host of retail shops on the basement and ground floors, while upper floors house offices, green spaces and events.
The most anticipated project opening of 2019
On the horizon is a trio of projects in Ningbo, China; the largest waste-to-energy plant in the world in Shenzhen, China; the 115,000 m² Shanghai Library East; and openings of additional redeveloped spaces at State Library Victoria in Melbourne.
The firm’s most anticipated project of 2019 is Ny Anstalt, a correctional facility that balances punishment and rehabilitation in Nuuk, Greenland.
The contrast between beauty and roughness is a guiding theme in the design for the new correctional facility in Nuuk. Openness, light, views, security and flexibility are the leading values behind the design of the first such facility in the capital of Greenland. The belief that the physical surroundings have an important impact on human behaviour and the will to collaborate has motivated the client to initiate a project of high architectural quality.
The facility is composed of a series of blocks positioned to follow the contours of the rocky landscape. In appreciation of its character, the orientation and scale of the project make the building appear subordinate to its surroundings. The project consists of five residential units with rooms for 76 inmates, in both a ‘closed’ and an ‘open’ section. A panoramic window in the common lounge area carries nature into each residential unit, and the inmates have an unrestricted view towards the sea from the windows in their cells.
Ny Anstalt is projected to complete in the first half of 2019.