Marine Education Centre
Under a huge roof, where landscape and building become one, visitors can learn about sustainability and people’s impact on the marine life.
Back in 2014 NORD Architects won the competition for a new Marine Education Centre in Malmo, Sweden, with an iconic building that brings visitors closer to hands-on experiences with life in sea and sustainability. The new centre blurs the distinction between architecture and landscape and creates a smooth transition from coast to sea.
“With the changing climate, rising oceans and increased severity of cloudbursts, there is a need more than ever to understand the profound influence that marine life and the oceans have on our lives. And the profound impact that people have on the life in oceans”, says Johannes Molander Pedersen, partner at NORD Architects.
The Marine Education Center’s goal is to improve the conditions for a viable sea by promoting knowledge, awareness and responsibility of citizens, business and decision makers – and welcomes everyone from school classes to families on tour. Based on research and collaboration with universities and research institutes, the center seeks continuously innovation and learning.
Flexible learning spaces under the unifying roof, creates an environment that alternates between indoor and outdoor activities and encourage visitors to dive into a multitude of experiments and science-based knowledge that focus on marine life. The building itself is promoting a sustainable approach and the roof expresses a performative combination of sustainable concepts and technique. All technical installations like water handling and circulation, solar energy production and consumption and ventilation were all on display in competition proposal and part of the total learning experience on resources and sustainability.
“We have developed a learning landscape where education is everywhere. It is in the landscape, in the building and in the transition between nature and culture. The centre is open for everyone who is interested in the role we as humans play in nature’s life cycle. It allows hands on learning experience that invites users to explore using their senses in the field, and thereafter analyze and understand their observations of the marine life”, says Johannes Molander Pedersen.
The Marine Education Centre was designed to be highly flexible, allowing the organisation and allocated functions to adapt over time with the emergence of new technologies and changing needs.
