Hvidovre is a suburb of Copenhagen, in which very little has happened since the area was developed about 50 years ago. It is a typical modernistic suburb with a large area of single family housing, large areas with housing blocks and a centrally placed city hall and library surrounded by empty green lawns and large areas for parking.
Hvidovre town center is a new development in the center of Hvidovre that implements a new denser urbanity into the center of Hvidovre with new types of housing, cultural programs, public institutions, shopping etc.
The new town center is connected to the surrounding areas via a green spine which provides citizens with a safe bike connection and the new town center itself has been developed over a series of smaller winding villlage-like streets that contrasts the long straight roads that most of this area has been planned with.
The development of the plan involved a long dialog process with citizens and politicians of the area. To create a special atmosphere in the area and move away from the ”just-another-suburb”-feeling BCVA worked intensively with the identity of the area. The strategy includes a special focus on bringing some of the many acitivties from organisations, schools an private initiatives (that today are hard to find) out in the open and using activities to create an active and dynamic center that will become the natural meeting point and for all citizens of the area. Besides becoming the active center of Hvidore, the development brings new housing typologies of a much more social caracter to the area.
The project will in the coming years transform the center of Hvidovre completely and create a strong sence of social urban space.