Natural History Museum of Denmark

Type
Museum
Research facilities
Landscape

Adress
Sølvgade 83, Copenhagen, Denmark

Area
Total 30.000 m²
New built 15.000 m²
Renovation/transformation 15.000 m²

Client
Vejdirektoratet

Tenant
University of Copenhagen

User
Natural History Museum of Denmark

Collaboration
Claus Pryds Arkitekter ApS

Engineer
EKJ Rådgivende Ingeniører

Landscape
Professor & landscape architect Steen Høyer
Julie Kierkegaard A/S

Year
Built 2019-2024
1. prize international competition 2012

Photo
Torben Eskerod
Vejdirektoratet

The Natural History Museum of Denmark is one of the largest museum construction projects in Denmark in recent times. The project brings together the Geological, Zoological, and Botanical Museums into a single world-class institution. The historic Sølvtorv complex from 1829 has been renovated and transformed, providing the University of Copenhagen with new facilities for teaching, research, and administration.

The Natural History Museum of Denmark is built up of a number of components. Half of the area is renovation and redesign of the listed Sølvtorv Complex from 1829. The other half is new construction with underground exhibition halls and storage facilities. The roof of the underground halls frames a new public space that echoes the sculpted rolling landscape of the neighboring Botanical Gardens.

Renovation with humility and honesty
The buildings in the Sølvtorvs Complex have been refurbished and redecorated with a view to preserve cultural heritage as much as possible. As many original floors, walls, doors, finishes and details as possible have been retained - and important rooms have been restored to their original state, while other spaces have been transformed, with completely new functions. The original Boiler building has been transformed into the museum café while the Machine Hall is now the museum shop.

The guiding principle of ‘Honesty in Renovation’ makes itself felt throughout the existing buildings. In laboratories it was necessary to introduce modern equipment and technology, but cable routing for these have been placed as visible, modern installations in the historic rooms. In this way, the different layers of construction details have been allowed to remain visible and tell their own story about the building's history.

This also has the advantage of preserving the rooms’ original proportions, which can still be seen behind the technical installations, which can also be maintained and replaced with minimal impact and waste.

Archaeological traces of color reveal the past life of the Sølvtorv complex
We have worked closely with the Copenhagen Conservator and carried out a meticulous review of the building’s color schemes and material choices. Decades of paint layers have been carefully removed, allowing us—quite literally—to get close to the rooms, colors, and details of earlier times.

Where possible, the original paint layers have been cleaned and preserved. In areas where the decorations had disappeared, they have been recreated—based on concrete documentation and with clear indication of what is original and what is new.

When the museum opens in 2027, visitors will be able to experience how colors, tiles, and friezes have become part of the museum’s narrative, serving as a testament to our ways of building and shaping spaces—both then and now.