Award winner for best Nordic urban plan

Nunarsuup qeqqani - Nuup qeqqani won the best Nordic urban plan award at the Nordic architecture festival – Arkitekturmässan, in Gothenburg.

From the awards ceremony at Världskulturmuseet.

”The jury commended the clear and strong narrative that resulted from an intense research and exchange with the local community. The plan comprises a contemporary approach to landscape and cultural issues. This is a convincing project that pushes the boundaries between many disciplines and is not afraid to touch on the hard social ambiguities and the adverse local conditions. It subtly deals with different typologies and introduces urban qualities by creating diversity and a balanced density.”

Project credits: Kommuneqarfik Sermersooq has in collaboration with The Government of Greenland prepared a comprehensive master plan for the Tuujuk and Block P areas in Nuuk. The masterplan NUNARSUUP QEQQANi / / Nuup QEQQANi / In the Middle of the World / / In the Middle of Nuuk has been developed after advice from Dahl & Uhre architects, (Tromsø) and tnt nuuk a/s. Project leader for the municipality: Jakob Bjerg Exner, project team leader: Knut Eirik Dahl. Additional assistance on master plan by MDH Architects (Oslo) and Asplan Viak landscape (Oslo). Energy advise by Steinsvik Arkitekter AS (Tromsø) and INUPLAN A/S (Nuuk). Additional guest projects that have contributed significantly to the project’s development have been provided by Fantastic Norway (Oslo), MDH Architects sa (Oslo), 42 architects + Regional associates (London) and tnt nuuk a/s, M: ARC ApS and Arkitekti ApS (Nuuk).
The plan has been developed in continuous dialogue with citizens and interest groups in Nuuk and with a broad specter of Nordic voices (the Tromsø Conversations).

For more information about the nominees and jury: Arkitekturmässans Award 2011.

2360 + 16 views on the book online!

Nunarsuup Qeqqani/Nuup Qeqqani - Midt i verden /Midt i Nuuk - The Book has been available on ISSUU in Danish for views and downloads for a while now, The Greenlandic version is just published, and we belive an English version (In the Middle of the world/In the Middle of Nuuk) is coming soon.  view or download the Danish version here

NOMINATION

Nunarsuup Qeqqani/Nuup Qeqqani is nominated to a Scandinavian Award,category urban planning. link to Arkitekturmässans Award. Congratulations to project owners, collaborators and dialogue partners in Nuuk and the world!

MIDT I VERDEN MIDT I NUUK

Vi hører fra Nuuk at utstillingen er godt besøgt, at skolene begynner å gi tilbakemeldinger og at Illimarfik virker interessert i å koble det på deres undervisning… I dag kommer 25 studenter fra bygge og anleggskolen og 5 fra kunstskolen på omvisning. Kommuneqarfik Sermersook er også invitert til å medvirke i KNRs debatprogram ”Tamassa”.
Utstillingen er lagt ut som nettpublikasjon, klikk zoom og les! det kan ta noe tid før sidene oppdaterer seg...

Open publication - Free publishing - More byudvikling

Go through the Exhibition

Nuuk TV interviews Jakob Bjerg Exner, Sermersooq Municipality (Kommuneqarfik Sermersooq) just before the exhibition Midt i verden /Midt i Nuuk (in The Middle of the World/ in The Middle of Nuuk) opens its doors. Link: NUUK TV

Exhibition opening in Nuuk

The Mayor of Nuuk, Asii Chemnitz Narup, giving her welcomming speech at the opening day of the exhibition. The text is the short version of her warm and hopefull words.

In The Middle of The World / In The Middle of Nuuk

We are on our way to Nuuk and Greenland.Kommuneqarfik Sermersooq, Sermersooq Municipality has in collaboration with Kalaallit Nunaanni Namminersorlutik Oqartussat, The Government of Greenland prepared a comprehensive master plan for the Tuujuk and Block, P areas. The exhibition of the Master Plan proposal for parts of the City Centre of the Capital Nuuk, titled In The Middle of The World/In The Middle of Nuuk , opens on the 5th of April. Our guests and collaborators, Minna Riska from MDH architects , Johan Berglund from 42architects + regionalasscosiates and Anders Hus Folkedal from Aspan Viak Landscape travel with us. Håkon Matre from Fantastic Norway has to stay at home, with his newly born child. In Greenland we will team up with our partners in TNT Nuuk architects and all our connections and friends. The exhibition will be open at least until the meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the Arctic Council in Nuuk from the 10th to the !6th of May. A series of discussions will follow the exhibition: To exhibit is to open up! More to come on this sermersooq press release: For better or worse, the Tuujuk and Block P developments stand as symbols of a time of great social and cultural challenges. But the buildings are also valued for their central location and is home to people with resources. The ties between the residents and the energy that exists, is strong. After a lifetime of 40 years, block P with its 135 apartments and 50 residential dwellings is due for demolition, and Block A - L in Tuujuk with 156 apartments will be undergoing a phased demolition over a period of years. The problem surrounding the buildings is simple - as time has passed, the housing has become outdated. In the process of rebuilding the areas, a number of important questions must be asked: What qualities exists today and what new possibilities and qualities should we aim to produce? What kind of life and environments should we strive to generate? What type of town should it be? What role could the district play in Nuuk's overall development? In short: What kind of capital city should we aim for? To answer these questions, new experiences must be acquired and new knowledge learned and understood. Our existing thought Models need to be renewed. Kommuneqarfik Sermersooq has in collaboration with The Government of Greenland prepared a comprehensive master plan for the Tuujuk and Block, P areas. The masterplan NUNARSUUP QEQQANi / / Nuup QEQQANi / In The Middle of the World / / In the Middle of NUUK has been developed after advice from Dahl & Uhre architects (Tromsø) and TNTnuuk A / S. Additionally, MDH Architects (Oslo), Fantastic Norway (Oslo), 42 architects + Regional associates (London), Asplan Viak landscape (Oslo) M: ARC and Arkitekti (Nuuk) has also contributed significantly to the project's development. The plan is developed in ongoing dialogue with residents and stakeholders and originates from a desire and willingness to provide Nuuk, the capital of Greenland, with new development opportunities for the city and its citizens. The plan seeks to ask and answer the right questions, which will be required to achieve this vision

Nuuk // summer laboratory of the young at heart

Klik på billedet for at få en appetizer for diskussion med med unge nuummiutere omkring Nuuks fremtid - byen de i fremtiden skal vende hjem til.

Klik her for at downloade hele diskussion.

Through a discussion over one month between us and the director of The Bank of Greenland, Peter Petersen, some stunning dialogues has appeared. These dialogues is soon presented as a chronological skype/mail conversation. Hopefully also in english. What you find here, the Summer Laboratory with the young at heart, came up in these discussions as a theme connected to what is needed, what is important politics in relation to get the educated young people back to Greenland. And what kind of transformation in Nuuk can be related to this. Helena Lennert in TNT Nuuk headed this summer laboratory in a beatifull way.

Writings on the Wall

This exhibition in Nuuk, in one of the apartments that in time to come may be demolished and recirculated, is part of our story bord for the evolution of the project that D&U and TNT Nuuk is in the middle of making. Our line of work involves series of discussions and conversations on many levels within the Nuuk society: "They shall see what we hear" is one of our postulates that charges our work. The newspaper text titled "Nuuks strangest neighbour" is a dialogue with the project leader from the town planning office, Jakob Bjerg Exner, about his interpretations of the public viewpoints amd their writings on the wall.

11 informative conversations

A map/summary, made by Alice Labadini, of the 11 studios our AHO students have been through in the last 30 days..

> pdf

Debatten fortsetter i Nuuk

Nuuk Ugeavis har åpnet en debattside for å motta synspunkter og meninger om bymidtens fremtid. Dette innlegget av Ane Geraae går direkte inn i vår diskusjon:

"TID
Vi må bare tage den tid, det tager at bygge byen op. Vi må lære noget af kulturchokket, vi har været udsat for. Derfor er det dummeste, vi kan gøre, at sætte kort tidsfrist til juni 2010. Efter min mening er det vigtigt, at vi ikke levere den samme vare og adfærd, som vi så og blev udsat for i 60’erne og 70’erne, altså hastige beslutninger over kort tid. Brug den tid, det tager, at debatere planen med byen. Sørg for så at så mange usikkerhedsmomenter som mulig er ude af debatten."

WOODEN CARVED MAPS IN CYBERSPACE

Yesterday two of our friends tipt us simultaniously about a blogpost on BLDGBLOG about Inuit tactile maps of the Greenland coastline. Marianne Skjulhaug called from Bergen and Ross Langdon sent a mail from Uganda (!). Follow the link and learn more. It is truly intriguing.
The carving is 300 years old and shows the coastline with fjords, islands, nunataks and glaciers. The outline of the coast is carried up one side and down the other.
Later today, Aviaaja and Helena from tnt nuuk is coming to stay the week in Tromsø on our 3'rd workshop about Nuup Qeqqani. We are sure they can tell us more about these maps and maybee we can see them for ourselves the next time we go to Nuuk...

Nuuk pressroom

The local press in Nuuk is continuously following the Tuujuk an Blok P project (in the middle of the world/in the hearth of Nuuk) as it evolves through dialogues with the public, think tanks, city walks/Nuuk Safaris etc. The journalists are making their own contributions through interviews with people living in the area, interviews with politicians and so on. The newspapers are inviting to a series of chronicles on the topic "The appearing and disappearing Nuuk". The small editorial on top of this post, "Democracy commits", is quite stunning with its strengthening of the importance of direct, face to face, eye to eye dialogue between the politicians, the architects and the residents of all kind. And the editorial announces these new attitudes and methods as very appropriate and to the point for the larger debate on the future of Greenland, relating to aluminium melting plants, exploitation of Uran and mining concessions of all types. The point, the editorial states, is for the politicians to be very aware of what is said and to take it to their heart and mind. The language in these articles is Greenlandic and Danish. More English short versions are to follow.

NUUK CITY WALK

This Postcard is a starting point for an exploration of the Nuuk to come. The shivering line guided the followers of the Nuuk Safari. This site in the capital contains many aspects of Greenland colonial history, and is a political hot topic. The long line in the middle is Blok P, which at one point in history contained 1% of the Greenland population. The conversations on the Nuuk Safari unfolded all shades of this history. One social worker characterized Blok P as "an evil circle shaped as a building". The housing minister of the Self Government, who took part in the Safari, has stated that Blok P is to be demolished in 2011; it is a main political ambition. A series of proposals from different architects in the last 20 years has proposed solutions for revitalization of Blok P. None has come to life - and the standard is on a level of being derelict. A large part of the surrounding blocks and row houses is also in the searchlight of demolition - in time to come. So, this postcard, and the walking line, is empowered by memories, anger, hopelessness and possibly new hope. It’s an explosive postcard, now in the hands of the people of Nuuk.

Nuuk today

Nuuk Safari 1 took place on a beautiful Saturday. Lots of people, including two ministers from the Self Government. The architect Helena Lennert from TNT Nuuk was a brilliant guide and storyteller in the language of Greenland, translated by herself to Danish. KED took a small part in this unfolding story, translated by Helena. The walk through the (in)famous Blok P and its larger surroundings was stunning. An appearing (and disappearing) Nuuk is on the table of discourse ! A discourse that is extensively unfolding in the newspapers, on TV and radio. All media where present on the Nuuk Safari, and the following coffee gathering in TNT Nuuks office (now also D&Us centre when staying in Greenland). More to come with links to TV-films, editorials in Newspapers, coffee visits in peoples home, with the Mayor, and much more.

NUUK SAFARI-illoqarfimmi angalaaqatigiinneq

Today we have been reading a paper titled "The Tromsø Experiment: Opening up for the unknown" (written in Melbourne!) to be published later this year. The poster Nuuk Safari extends practices and methods from The City Development Year/CDY in Tromsø to Nuuk in Greenland.
D&U, with tnt nuuk architects, is involved in the transformation of this city and its center. Self-Government of Greenland and the City of Nuuk, by its Mayor has invited us into this very challenging task. May bee the most important thing for us to learn is Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit "the Inuit way of doing things".
Next week we take off to the second Nuuk Think-Tank. Dialogue, debate and city walks. The project blog is up and going, you can follow the process at Nunarsup Qeqqani // Nuup Qeqqani - In the middle of the world // In the heart of Nuuk..

Kalaallit Nunaat 2010

In the middle of the world, in the land of the people, change is happening. In the first week of 2010 we were a part of a think tank in the heart of Nuuk with the Self-Government of Greenland, the Municipality of Sermersooq,
tnt nuuk architects, social workers, artists and journalists discussing steps towards social and environmental sustainable city development. More will follow when we togehter with Helena, Aviaaja and Flemming from tnt nuuk launch the blog Nunarsuup Qeqqani at the end of January.