THESIS TOPIC: YOUTH CENTER
hall and a youth center together.
LITERATURE CASE STUDY: GERSONSVEJ YOUTH
CENTER
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
Architects: CEBRA, Dorte Mandrup
Area: 2600m2
The building is situated in a residential area in
a northern suburb of copenhagen. The area
predominately coniss of large villas from the
turn of the century. This location made it
necessary to adapt the building to the hous-
ing context while protecting its users from the
traffic.The establishment of a traditional hall as
a freestanding building body and a separate
box for the youth centre would have been
alien to the area.
The main aim of Gersonvej center is to merge the sports
There aree three slender building profiles with pitched
roof are placed parallel to the tracks.
The traditional profiles refer to the surrounding houses
and the horizontality of the volumes reflects the direc-
tion of the traffic.
The north end of the plot the three profiles are pressed
together tightly, but as they move southwards they start
separating and twist and bend out of shape. This shape
has led to the building being described as a flat hand
with three outspread fingers. To the north, the palm of
the hand contains the multi-purpose hall whereas the
secondary functions, such as workshops, computer
stations and music facilities, are placed in the fingers.
The building seems to embrace and protect the green
outdoor areas emerging between the outspread fingers.
At the same time the outdoor areas with large trees are
included into the overall complex. Building and land-
scape interweave to create a series of outdoor pockets,
which serve as protected spaces. By including the
children and staff throughout the design phase the
project arrived at diverse palette of functions unique to
the area. The project’s “sports section” and adjacent
activity spaces are linked to the heart of the building, a
kind of multifunctional living room for play and social
activities. This space also serves as entrance to the
fingers’ three “villas”, which contain music rooms, the
atelier with creative workshops and the café/eating area
respectively.
The center is in the embrace of the landscaape which As the the center is placed in three villas which is
is visible from all the sides of the structure which is connected to each other and which have various
gives the good amount of ventilation and light source activities for the people
which lits up the space more and make it more open