STREETDOME
Danish architecture and design practices CEBRA and Glifberg+Lykke have designed a multi park and cultural centre for street sports on the harbour front of Haderslev in southern Denmark. StreetDome is a vast and unique urban landscape for activity and recreation including a 4.500 square metre skate park, facilities street basket, parkour, boulder climbing, canoe polo etc.
StreetDome’s overall ambition is to set new standards for urban arenas for unorganised sports. StreetDome is an open playground and social meeting place for different ages, skill levels and cultures. The project started out almost ten years ago as an initiative by local activist and chairman of the SkateCity association Morten Hansen, whose vision was to create a new cultural hub that incorporates a vast area for activity and recreation.
The close collaboration between CEBRA and Glifberg+Lykke resulted in a fusion of architecture, design and function, which forms StreetDome’s underlying DNA and binds the entire park together to form an interacting whole. The result is a new cultural magnet with strong local roots and an international scope. In the planning phase the design team has implemented the results from the comprehensive dialogue with a wide range of the facility’s future user groups. This process has been an essential element right from project’s initial phases and has left a clear mark on the final design.
The Park
Glifberg+Lykkes design for the skate park is divided into three overall sections consisting of the street plaza, which extends around the transitions-based flow section and the park section characterized by ditches and banks. Every element and obstacle is designed for adaptive use so that new flows, rhythms and combinations can be explored and discovered over and over again. The park develops over time along with the users’ skills and imagination and continuous to challenge the athletes on sporting as well as creative levels and without an expiration date.
The Dome
The StreetDome itself is based on CEBRA’s igloo hall concept. To reduce running costs, the hall is unheated and lit primarily through daylight while the building’s surface area has been minimized through its dome shape. The roof spans around 40 meters and allows for a large open space free of load-bearing structures, which can be fitted out for any kind of sports and activities, in this case skateboarding, boulder climbing and street basket.
The Igloo is adapted to both the site and the specific function of skateboarding and street culture. On the outside, the dome is an actual part of the skate park, growing out of the concrete landscape like a mushroom. The structure is designed as a functional part of the park to skate on with banks, stairs and slopes along the rim. Inside, a series of pools are scooped out of the floor next to a street basket court and a central boulder structure containing a performance platform, seating and bathrooms. Wide gates open to the outside connecting the surrounding skate park with the inside floor, creating a seamless flow through the entire park. StreetDome forms one continuous and varied spatial course, which gives Scandinavia a modern street sport arena with unique features and possibilities.
CEBRA has previously designed a series of sports facilities, including another low-cost, lightweight sports hall concept called Meccano, which is based on standardised off-the-shelf components otherwise known from industrial buildings and warehouses. Much like the Igloo structure concept the Meccano concept provides sports and leisure facilities, which are accessible to the general public and can be easily adapted to a wide range of activities and varying locations.
Initiator and project development: Morten Hansen
Funding: A.P. Møller Fonden
The Danish Foundation for Culture and Sports Facilities
Realdania
Nordea-fonden
Project size: 1.500 m² StreetDome, 4.500 m2 skate park
Year: 2011 – 2014
