Nexus - Digital Case

From analogue to digital landscapes

With Revit, landscape architecture is moving away from difficult workflows with, among other things, analogue counting of bicycle parking spots, trees and areas. Instead, Revit can ensure and raise architectural quality by supplying value to projects through digital design.
  • Bygningsstyrelsen
    Client
  • A. Enggaard A/S
    Contractor
  • MOE A/S
    Engineer
  • Location
    Carsten Niebuhrsgade, København V
  • Year
    2014-2018
  • Size
    6.400 m²
  • Awards
    1. præmie i OPP-konkurrence 2014
  • Architect
    Arkitema
  • Landscape
    Arkitema Urban
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Landscape architects can constantly work synergistically with building architects and, as a result, ensure a digital workflow that flows dynamically in the 3D model. Thanks to three-dimensional sketching and designing in a collaborative programme, the result is an integrated project where landscape features are just as thoughtfully designed and varied as building architecture.

Nexus - a digital landscape in flow

One of the first projects in the 3D programme Revit, which kick-started the digital transformation of Arkitema’s landscape architects, is the terraced landscape around the Nexus project in Copenhagen. Our ambition was to establish a new, green connection through the city and an attractive outdoor space. At the same time, the vision was to design the landscape with green terraces, which have an overall rise of four metres, and which integrates rainwater management in an ambitious climate change adaptation project that is situated like a green wedge between the two office buildings. This is a complex task, as it is also located on top of heated decks where the two buildings are connected underground. Therefore, the transitions between landscape and building had to be closely and continuously coordinated.

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Arkitema Nexus Landscape 06 web
Through the use of Revit, an aesthetic, functional and sustainable design emerged

Landscape architects were able on the one hand to easily model and outline the best solutions and to have a continuous overview of the handling of rainwater management in relation to the correct volume and the designing of SuDS drains and basins (Sustainable Drainage Systems), and on the other hand they were able to manage local planning needs for terraces, which should be in close interaction with the building’s façades as well as ensuring accessibility through the green terraces, but also via the entrance to the building. In this way, the project was continuously examined through sections and 3D screenshots, which were used in a dynamic dialogue with the developer, the building architects, the contractors and other partners.

Digital forum for landscape architects

To ensure the continued development of digital landscapes, Arkitema Urban has established a digital community with digital specialists and LIM (Landscape Information Modelling) specialists who train and share knowledge with the landscape architects. Here, they meet across the studio's locations and become aware of land differences, requirements and the scope of digital opportunities. One of the results of this strategic initiative is, among other things, that Arkitema's landscape departments are among the best in the country and continuously develop their own professional landscape and parametric Revit families, such as planting types.

If you want to hear more about Arkitema’s approach to the digitalisation of landscape architecture, contact landscape architect Marianne Brandt Bundgaard, Digital Lead Urban & Infrastructure DK, SE, NO.

Arkitema Nexus Landscape 01 web
Arkitema Nexus Landscape 07 web