The City and Bay

Over the past 20 years Aarhus city and harbour has undergone a major transformation. Part of this is the development of the new city area, Aarhus Ø, established on the former container pier. A residential highrise building known as 'Lighthouse' has been built on the pivot point between the city and the bay. The client has in conjunction with the 400 apartments established a visitor centre entitled Aarhus Øje, which offers a 250m2 exhibition space, a restaurant and viewing platform on the 44th floor as well as a brasserie on the 1st floor.
The main objective of the exhibition, 'The City & Bay' is to tell the story about the interrelation between the 1250 year old city of Aarhus and its relation to the Bay of Aarhus. Aarhus is closely linked to the sea and is built in close connection with the bay's many coastal communities, islands and the unique conditions and resources. For nearly a year, Team Kollision has worked on designing and producing the exhibition in collaboration with the client group. The exhibition forms a holistic experience aiming at introducing visitors to the surrounding urban areas near Lighthouse and the historic development of the harbour as well as the nature in and around the bay.
We created a conceptual framework, where the visitors experience a series of narratives, which takes their departure in the stone reefs and among the animal life of the bay and ends with the urban development of Aarhus and its harbour. The framework acted as an instrumental guide in the dialog with the client and assisted greatly with the design process of transforming a difficult basement space with many ceiling mounted technical installations into a coherent and exciting exhibition space.

On the entrance area of the ground-floor various installations introduce the visitor to Aarhus Ø and the achievement of constructing Lighthouse through a combination of physical models, dynamic lights, film and images. Above you hang a large group of light sources, designed as a school of jellyfish all making use of a coherent light design that plays with the idea of living creatures in the nearby sea. Visitors are encouraged to download an app before accessing the exhibition below ground. The main exhibition is reached by an elevator, where sound and visuals create the experience of diving beneath the surface of the sea. As the doors open, visitors arrive at the seabed near the stone reef. Here you are met by the main exhibition wall shaped as a long continuous curve creating niches and subdivided presentation areas - from the stone reef, through wildlife and edible nature, to the forests flanking Aarhus, and into the history of the city and the urban life.

The exhibition blends graphics, text, 3D objects, projections, screens, dynamic lighting, and soundscapes. Small experience oriented dioramas making use of 3D prints combined with screens are recessed into the curved walls. Some exhibition elements cater to the historically inclined, others to children by inviting them to crawl into a sewer pipe or observing sea creatures through a water telescope. Screens of different sizes encourage visitors to use their own phones to scan QR codes placed throughout the exhibition. The QR codes trigger video content and the app and exhibition system allow the visitors to listen to synchronised narratives in either Danish or English. Opposed to digesting the entire exhibition, visitors can either experience key narratives marked as fast track or simply visit the cinema space and watch the film "Aarhus and the Bay over 1250 Years." The film is displayed on a large screen and combined with a projection onto a three-dimensional landscape model of the entire Aarhus Bay.

The film concludes with a 360-degree view of Aarhus from the top of Lighthouse, preparing visitors to comprehend the city and its surrounding landscape. The visit at Aarhus Øje ends by ascending to the top floor of the 142 metres building. Here, on top of the city and the bay, the building and the view speak for themselves, complemented only by an old fresnel lamp from one of the harbour's former lighthouses. The observant visitor will notice that the ceiling in this spectacular space is designed with inspiration from the fresnel lens and furthermore refer to the function of a lighthouse bridging between the city and the bay.

Kollision designed the physical exhibition and identity in collaboration with Venge Design and graphic designer, Helene Dalgaard. Content was created in partnership with Niels Krogh Nielsen and Mette Munkholm Svantemann from Aarhus SeaRangers. Kollision developed all digital platforms, interactive projections, and digital communication, based on photos and footage from various photographers and digital archives. Kollision controls all lighting through our MAP player across all three exhibition levels - exhibition, entrance and level 44. Exhibition hardware and infrastructure were planned in dialogue with hardware supplier CIPEX, which installed all the hardware. Development and construction were shaped through discussions with DLT, who produced and installed the physical exhibition parts. The audio app, Useeum, conveys and synchronises the narratives and was customised for the exhibition in collaboration with Useeum and Makeable. Pierre Greenway built the Lighthouse scale model and Jonas Højgaard designed the jellyfish lamp. FORMIII designed the restaurants and the interior design of the ground-floor. 3XN designed Lighthouse.

Movie by Allan Toft.