H.C. Andersen Hus Museum by Kengo Kuma and Associates celebrates a fairy tale world through architecture
Rasmus Hjortshøj

H.C. Andersen Hus Museum by Kengo Kuma and Associates celebrates a fairy tale world through architecture

1 Apr 2022  •  News  •  By Allie Shiell

In the heart of the city where H.C. Andersen was born, the new H.C. Andersen Hus Museum by Kengo Kuma and Associates celebrates his stories and fairy tales not only in their written form but also through the physical spaces of the museum, cultural centre and garden.  

Rasmus Hjortshøj

The project site is located between a residential area with small traditional wooden houses from the middle age and the newly developed urban area of Odense. In response to its context, the architectural built form is diminished with the main exhibition spaces located underground. Above ground is an enchanting garden featuring a curving linear hedge that traces the outline of the exhibition spaces beneath the ground. 

Rasmus Hjortshøj

Meandering paths through the garden are intended to be experienced as an extension of the museum. As part of this experience, the underground world is connected to the garden above through a series of sunken gardens that appears like ‘holes’ in the ground and reference, like in the writings of Andersen, a ‘portal’ from the fairy tale world to the outside. 

Rasmus Hjortshøj

In the coming years, it is foreseen that the garden will mature, offering visitors and the community an enhanced sense of nature and seasons, change of colours, scent, density, transparency, and scenery in its growth. 

Rasmus Hjortshøj

The architects explain that the architectural and landscape design together reflect the profound messages that can be found in HC Andersen’s writing that reflect the author’s life and life journey, projecting the duality of opposites that surrounds us, real and imaginary, natural and manmade, human and animal, light and dark. 

Rasmus Hjortshøj