Mirrors and shelters prevent animals seeing the visitors at Givskud Zoo, Denmark
in the wild. In this case, the brief created a natural starting point for our design; the continuous and diverse landscape seam- lessly serves animal and human needs.
Did you aim to build a futuristic zoo? What architectural qualities make it a zoo of the future? The zoo’s aim was really to try to be a place where visitors don’t notice the barriers between them and the animals, turning the traditional zoo inside-out. It was also a question of trying to find ways of creating a successful cohabitation between humans and different species of animals. What we’ve tried to do is to eliminate all traces of human architecture, so there are no buildings. This means no Chinese pagodas or African huts. Instead, you’ll see rolling hills growing over the areas where
©CYBERTREK 2015 AM 3 2015
the lions retreat when the winter gets cold in Denmark; combinations of level changes; and trenches with water where the depth prevents certain animals from crossing. With the bears, your cable car might come close but it won’t bring you within range.
How is the visitor experience incorporated into the architecture? One main innovation in visitor experience has been the car safari, where you take a personal vehicle and drive amongst lions. It’s a surreal clash of something incredibly familiar and something highly exotic. We’re organising our own car safari as a loop that frames the park, so from the car you have an overview and experience of animals from across the globe. We also have mirrored capsules strung on a cable car system, so the visitor safely
hovers just above the environments while blending in with the surroundings.
Did you have concerns about modern zoos when you began this project? Do you believe Givskud is a realistic proposition in terms of animals and visitors interacting this way? Despite the anachronistic nature of zoos – especially in a time when inexpensive air travel and live images make wildlife more present in our everyday lives – they are still important as forms of education, research and preservation.
If you can design a zoo that uses the natural landscape as inspiration and where humans and other species exist in close proximity in harmony, then the result will be successful. If you can design a great zoo, you can design a great city.
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