In an effort to address the architecture industry’s environmental impact, Henning Larsen is presenting the “Changing Our Footprint” exhibition at Aedes Architecture Forum in Berlin. The event features the small but scalable steps that the office is taking to move towards a more desirable future through the projects they are designing and the research they are conducting. The exhibition aims to be an engaging event, inviting visitors to participate in the dialogue, to think critically about the proposed solutions and initiatives, and to ask difficult questions in the search for better outcomes. The exhibition is open until March 22, 2023. Henning Larsen will also host a series of panel debates at the Aedes Architecture Forum from February 22 to March 14.
The exhibition is divided into two sections: “Share” and “Explore”. It showcases and explores the new tools and materials available for the architectural design process in an attempt to be transparent and open source. Henning Larsen’s wood and bio-based material publication “Plant a Seed” is on display and available to be downloaded for free, along with their Unboxing Carbon Catalogue. The materials collected present complex data from the Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) in a readily understandable way.
The ”Share” room provides an introductory course on the knowledge and tools to calculate embodied CO2 for building materials. The “Unboxing Carbon” installation invited visitors to step inside a carbon box to help them understand the materials used in the building industry and their footprint. Visitors can also participate in the ‘unboxing carbon’ workshop by arranging the materials on display from good to bad, as a large interactive table provides the setting for collaboration and discussion.
The ”Explore” section presents the practical use of bio-based materials such as wood, straw, eelgrass, mycelium, reused bricks, low-carbon concrete, and clay. It also tackles themes such as design for disassembly, 3D printing, and indoor climate. Among the digital tools available to interact with, the Urban DeCarb app allows users to calculate the carbon impact at an urban scale.
For years we have worked full steam ahead, focusing a lot on aesthetics, and now we are revisiting and rethinking the way we work. As sustainability becomes the main design driver, the building blocks of our industry are changing. But we still have much to learn and unlearn as we reshape our industry’s outsized environmental impact. - Louis Becker, Global Design Principal, Henning Larsen
Established in 1980 as the first private architecture gallery in Europe, Aedes Architecture Forum is an independent institution and exhibition, a platform for fostering public discourse related to the built environment, contemporary architecture, and urban design. For its 40th anniversary, Aedes organized a retrospective forum, “From Postmodernism into the Digital Age,” showcasing the wide range of themes addressed by the organization, from women empowerment to sustainability and and visionary concepts from around the world. In 2022, Dorte Mandrup opened the PLACE exhibition to investigate the role of context in creating sustainable solutions for the future.
