Age of Nature. Architecture and Nature meet at DAC Copenhagen

Age of Nature. Architecture and Nature meet at DAC in Copenhagen

On the occasion of World Architecture Day, the exhibition Age of Nature was inaugurated on 6 October in the main gallery of the Danish Architecture Centre (DAC).

Above: photo by Anders Sune Berg. Courtesy of DAC

‘Age of Nature’, DAC – Danish Architecture Center, 2025 – Photo Anders Sune Berg.
Courtesy of DAC

With ‘Age of Nature,’ DAC focuses on one of the most pressing challenges of our time: how can future urban planning and architecture reconcile the needs of humans with nature while promoting biodiversity for the benefit of all?
Age of Nature presents pioneering projects by Danish and international architects, scientists, and artists who have addressed the theme through a different approach, viewing nature as an active partner rather than an obstacle to development.
The projects on display seek to answer four questions, pointing to new possible directions: Can we build cities while preserving biodiversity? Can we avoid consuming land by, for example, rethinking the ways we produce food? Can technology be harnessed to ‘cure’ nature, and how much can we gain by revisiting some of our architectural traditions and learning from nature itself?

The exhibition begins in an AI-generated forest. From there, a timeline takes visitors through Earth’s evolution, stretching back 3.5 billion years.
In the last 200 years, however, radical change has occurred: the Earth’s population has grown from one to eight billion, while wild animal populations have halved, and over 70% of biodiversity has disappeared. While asteroids and ice ages once impacted life on Earth, the change is now driven by human lifestyles.

‘Age of Nature’, DAC – Danish Architecture Center, 2025 – Photo Anders Sune Berg.
Courtesy of DAC

Among the many projects and research on display are the floating islands by Dutch studio Ossidiana, where humans, animals, and plants coexist; the Biogenic Building project by the research team at CITA (Center for IT and Architecture), which shows how bark woven with seagrass can form structural elements that biodegrade, creating an architecture designed to decay; and the project by landscape architect Bas Smets, who for the public space around Notre Dame applied natural processes to create climate-controlled zones—for example, harnessing the wind blowing from the Seine, using trees to create evapotranspiration and lower the perceived temperature—demonstrating how natural elements in public space already offer solutions to future challenges.

‘Age of Nature’ is open until May 17, 2026.
DAC (Danish Architecture Center) Bryghuspladsen 10, 1473 Copenhagen, Denmark.

‘Age of Nature’, DAC – Danish Architecture Center, 2025, installation views – Photos ny Anders Sune Berg. Courtesy of DAC.