Last week, Copenhagenize Design Company moved from our old office in Frederiksberg, down to the harbour area of Copenhagen. Our new home is Papirøen, or ‘Paper Island,’ an artificial island just across the water from The Royal Danish Playhouse and Nyhavn. It was first used by the army as somewhere to put their weaponry, and then from 1958 the island was for many decades used for the storage of huge rolls of paper imported from Sweden, ready for use by Danish newspapers. Hence the name. (Interestingly almost the whole of Christianshavn was for a long time entirely used by the military, until the ‘Copenhagenization’ of the Danish military by the British in 1807 meant that suddenly the navy didn’t need so much space. So you could say we are re-Copenhagenizing Christianshavn)
Until the long awaited completion of the Inderhavnsbroen cycle and pedestrian bridge, this side of the harbour is a little isolated from the rest of the city, despite its central location. This has meant that in recent years, the site has become what the Copenhagen Post called 'an industrial no-man’s-land,' home to the city's harbour cruise company, but not much else.
However, things are starting to change. Last year, the old industrial warehouses were converted into a set of offices housing our new neighbours, including Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, COBE Architects and Purpose Makers (the company of Ole, of 'Cycling Without Age' fame) . It is also temporarily home to the Experimentarium, a science and technology centre and one of Copenhagen's biggest attractions, which will be on the island for 2 years whilst its permanent home in Hellerup is modernised. This gives the space around our new offices a healthy mix of creative workers and exuberant school kids.
We were all very excited about moving. But we had to get there first. How to do so was a no-brainer. As our work on the Cycle Logistics project has shown, the cargo bike is a versatile tool for goods transportation: 51% of deliveries currently made by motorized transport could be made by bike. Aside from anything else, cargo bike was the most logical and convenient way for us to move.
Copenhagenize Moves Office from Copenhagenize on Vimeo.
We put together this short film of the trip - what was interesting to note along the way was that although we were in a convoy of three heavily-laden cargo bikes, nobody en route batted an eyelid. Cargo Bikes are normal on Copenhagen's streets: 25% of families with two or more children have one.
Apart from having to balance holding a camera with keeping my eyes on the road, it was otherwise a sedate, unremarkable glide through Copenhagen, just like every day. Loading up the cargo bikes took just a few minutes, and the trip itself was an easy ride of just a little over 6km. It was a lovely sunny day too, which helped, but even aside from that little stroke of luck, there's no way hiring a van, negotiating it through the city-centre traffic, and having to return it at the end of the day would have been as simple, easy and enjoyable as moving office via cargo bike.
Below are some photos of our new place and the island itself – we're looking forward to the summer and spending some quality time out in the sun overlooking the water.
