A Down-to-Earth Approach to High-Flying Architectural Visions

Aarhus Festuge is known for showcasing exciting installations in open spaces, and Harbour Magnets was no exception. The eight installations designed by the French architecture firm LIST were—just as the name suggests—intended to be crowd-pullers, drawing visitors from the city center toward the waterfront. Ambiente was chosen to bring five of these creative ideas to life—a task that required extensive technical expertise and knowledge of safety in open spaces.

The Journey from the Drawing Board to Reality
Although none of the magnets immediately appeared to be complicated installations, their simple appearance concealed a great deal of technical ingenuity and creative ways of solving challenges. Among other things, the project included a helium balloon floating nine meters above the ground. Since helium evaporates, the balloon had to be “refueled” once a day, but because it would be too time-consuming to take it down and put it back up every day, a creative solution was needed. The solution was a small transparent tube that ran along one of the balloon’s steel wires, providing easy access for helium refills at a height of nine meters.

Do-how makes even the wildest ideas possible
Habour Magnets became one of the Festival Week’s biggest attractions, and that was exactly what we had taken into account. The installations not only had to withstand wind and weather, but also the strain of thousands of visitors. Because when others see a creative concept, Ambiente also sees the construction, safety, and solution behind it.