Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects, Copenhagen, Denmark

The narrative is a very precise part of our architecture at Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects. We work with the narrative as a process of retelling a story or a place, not as a diagram, but as one big common story that we try to tell with one voice and with a clear message, that can reach and touch many people. At the same time, we keep the door open to working with the emotional, the impression, the textural and tactile as part of the story… As architects, we have a tendency to keep re-writing the narrative, and as Scandinavians we have a tendency to do this in an almost dogmatic approach. Not in a “less is more” approach, but to make the idea more precise and get to the essence; the one story that embeds the whole building. The choice of materials is part of the story and we strongly believe this brings the “poetry” into our architecture – all the things that you can’t necessarily describe through a narrative, but suddenly it is there because of this very precise choice of material that moves you in a different way.