BELLASTOCK.

dk
bilan expérience 2011
CONTEXT

Aarhus, Denmark Institut for (X)

At the entrance of the Baltic sea, Aarhus is a dynamic Institut for (X) is composed by some disused technical
student city, the second one of Denmark. Its urban buildings of an old train station. Located in a left over
morphology, geographical condition, climate, culture, area, in the middle of the city and only a few minutes
demography... alls differents to the parisian ones were walking from the main cultural spots. The buildings have
the opportunity to confront the Bellastock principles to been refurbished by a builder collective, Büro Detours, and
another context. form now the main alternative cultural place of the city.
Settling the Bellastock up in that characteristical place
was the opportunity to experiment an alternative way of
building and living inside the city itself, and enjoying its
proximity’s benefits ; technical network, visibility..
It was also a way to highlight the work of Büro Detours
and show to citizens the potential of this kind of industrial
Aarhus Festival abandonned area.
The festival of Aarhus is the largest theme festival in
northern Europe. It takes place for one week since
1965 at the end of August. During these days, artistical
performances, installations and live music are spread
around the city that is filled by a party and convivial mood.
Bellastock took advantage of this event to give participants
the possibility to act into the city directly after the
ephemeral city’s establishment, increasing in the same
time the visibility of an ephemeral utopia.
The festival was also very helpful to create industrial and
photo
private partnerships and they provide us a logistical and
communication support. godsbanen
THE MATERIALS
An ephemeral and sustainable The beer crate
workshop based on an industrial and In Denmark, unlike in France, beer crates are part of an
industrial process accessible by everyone.
reused process Using it as constructive element, we interrogate the
structural potential of this «everyday object», light,
waterproof and easy to handle.
Regarding to the history of Bellastock, sustainability Thus 10.000 crates were borrowed from local brewery , to
and ephemerality are closely linked. reduce the cost carbon due to the transportation, and used
Since 2009 the festival works on the employment during 6 days to build a small city and the urban action
of industrial element as main material for the projects.
construction of the ephemeral city.
Thus for the Palet City, elements were borrowed, used
in a different context regarding to an unique scenario
and then given back intact to their industrial cycle.
This sustainable approach based on a process of reuse
imposes some construction’s contraints : palets were
tie together with reused bike tire - no nails, no screws.

Uncertain about the repetition of the danish edition,

we tried to push this process as far as possible.
The palets used to carry and deliver the 10.000 crates
formed the floor of the city. This artificial upper floor
insure a stable foundation and protect from the potential
waterflowd. They also create the grid of the ephemeral
city’s parcellar.

The stone paper is a biodegradable, waterproof

and hard-to-break material. It was used as waterproof
layer for the roof.
1.000 printed sheets (60x90cm) were recuperated
and reused for the workshop, instead of using plastic
tarpaulin.

The colson strips were used to tie the crates

together. At the end they are collected and sort with plastic
wastes.
Used for a simplicity and structural it is the only material
out of the reused process.

The wooden clits could be used to strenghen the

roofing, to consolidate the span of the beams or to expand
the cantilever. Each team can have 4 of it. They are offered
to Büro Detours at the end of the workshop that will use
them for future projects.

The rolled grass was employed by the participants

to create confortable seats, to develop landscape project
or as additional roof layer, making the constructions more
comfortable.
At the end they were used to improve the Büro Detours’
landscape project into the Institute.
A TWO TIMES WORKSHOP
The Beer Crates City The Urban Action
The establishment of an ephemeral city is not only Act within the city is an opportunity to confront directly
the occasion to build at scale one, it is also a way to the knowledge participants gained during the workshop
experiment an urban utopia, a new way of living together, and to recontextualize the material in an real urban
as a social issue. context.
The urban rules are related to the intrinsic specificities of The structure perturbates the public space and strikely
the material employed. The originality of this one ; palets, contrasts by its materiality with the surroundings and
sand, air or plastic crates, provide to each edition a specific cultural habits.
and exciting scenario. The city appears like an inner world, However, built during Aarhus Festival, the installation is
linked and disconnected in the same time with the society. dedicated to the citizens’ use that pass through and has
to show them the potential of this light and alternative
architecture.
 Lecture / Exhibition / Bar
«The One Breath City» Auditorium / Arkitektskolen

Lecture / Exhibition / Bar

«The One Breath City»
«The One Breath City»
Lecture / Exhibition / Bar
METHODS

Lecture / Exhibition / Bar

«The One Breath City»

Lecture / Exhibition / Bar

«The One Breath City»
Exhibitions
Auditorium / Arkitektskolen

Auditorium / Arkitektskolen
Friday 1st April at 16:15

Friday 1st April at 16:15

Several exhibitions and lecture with international guests
has been organized during the year.
Before, during and after the festival, their goals were
Auditorium / Arkitektskolen
Friday 1st April at 16:15

Friday 1st April at 16:15

to explain the history of Bellastock, to spread out its
principles and prepare the participants giving them
knowledge and reflexion tools about the possibility of this
light and unusual architecture.

«The One Breath City» Friday 1st April at 16:15

Lecture / Exhibition / Bar Auditorium / Arkitektskolen

«The One Breath City» Friday 1st April at 16:15 «The One Breath City» Friday 1st April at 16:15
Lecture / Exhibition / Bar Auditorium / Arkitektskolen Lecture / Exhibition / Bar Auditorium / Arkitektskolen

posters made with images from Ant Farm and Hans Walter Müller works. Friday 1st April at 16:15
«The One Breath City» Friday 1st April at 16:15 «The One Breath City» Friday 1st April at 16:15
Lecture / Exhibition / Bar Auditorium / Arkitektskolen Lecture / Exhibition / Bar
Auditorium / Arkitektskolen
Auditorium / Arkitektskolen
Bellastock lecture & exhibition
1st April 2011 The Sandy Shop
21, 22, 23, 24th may 2010

Carrière-sous-Poissy (78)

25km PVC plastic bags

600m3 of sand

A lecture-exhibition was organized to sensibilize students

600 builders, 50 staff, 250 visitors

67000 €

to the Bellastock project. Two young architects from the The Palet City
association has been invited to explain the history and june 6,7,8th 2009

Issoudin (36)

goals of the festival, and the intentions for the danish

3600 pallets
bike inner tubes

350 builders, 30 staff, 100 visitors

35000 €

edition. It was also the opportunity to communicate the NEW CONTEXT, NEW SCALE, NEW TEAM

«One Breath City» scenario to attract some foreigners For this edition, Bellastock becomes an
independant association formed by 15 students
from each parisian school. The new structure
gathered 650 architecture students from schools
all over France that built during 4 days an

students.
ephemeral city made of sand bags ! This material
gives a very strong relationship between the
constructions and the site, the ground being used
as a constructive material. Fast, economic and
refearing to emergency architecture, this strategy
also joins the sustainable goals of Bellastock.
A NEW REUSE STRATEGY

The lecture was followed by a vernissage where the team

A lot of infrastructures, mobile kitchens, showers,
The palet city is a turning point in the story of the festival. scene, bars, theater have been produced to
The festival opens to the other french architecture schools create a reflexion about the nomad potential of
and the number of participant increases impressively. the city. After, the mobile kitchens were lent to
associations to fed homeless people.
The palets are borrowed for a few days, assembled with
bike inner tubes instead of nails to keep them intact «The Sandy Shop» is also the first edition taking

met the students, teachers and municipal representants to

and then reinjected in their industrial cycle. As a unique place in a suburban context, at only 30mn from
material, the palet becomes the symbole of the edition. Paris. More than offering infrastructures, the urban
proximity gives more visibility to the festival that
The urbanism is planned as a flexible grid allowing students was related by several media.
to develop the ephemeral city whiwh is ponctuated by
functionnal infrastructures : kitchens, shower, toilets, bars
and scene.

discuss about the project.

The sustainable question is also emphasized, not only by
the choice of the palet but also by optimization of the
transport and the implantation, as the infrastructures use
the natural site’s potential.

One Breath City

21, 22, 23, 24th may 2010

Infrastructures
Carrière-sous-Poissy (78)

25km PVC plastic bags

600m3 of sand

600 builders, 50 staff, 250 visitors

67000 €

A POETIC ARCHITECTURE,
FROM HEAVINESS TO LIGHTNESS
IMMATERIAL, MADE OF AIR
The One Breath City uses the
air as a constructive element, AND LIGHT
a logical but inverse transition For this new edition we have focused our
with the previous edition. attention on inflatable architecture, an
architecture of air and textile, floating
At the opposite of the sand, the and dreamlike.
air gives a up-rising dynamic.
To build a inflatable city means to engage its
habitants in a common flux, a single breath as
a direct link.
In this city of air, the conventional distinctions
between the inside and the outside become
ambiguous. A city materialized by a collective
act of imagination. A project that voluntarily
plays on the utopia of the event and the
pragmastism of the questions it raises : to
inhabit and to live together.

Thus the lightness of this city discourses with

the ambiguity and intensity of the event, a
shared experience.

AN EPHEMERAL ARCHITECTURE
Light and easy to convey, inflatable architecture can be
remove and install anywhere, as long as air is provided.
For this edition, Bellastock purposes a nomad city. Students
will provide a collective effort to build their structures and
could keep them after the festival. Thus they can blow
them up in other contexts and re-contextualized this urban
utopia.

Dedicated to disappear, the One Breath City assumes its

ephemeral singularity and gets in line with the strategy of
its disappearance.
Bubble exhibition
1st June 2011

An inflatable structures from the One Breath City has

been brought to Aarhus, repaired and used to host
an ephemeral exhibition relating the Bellastock 2011
experience.
Set into the canteen courtyard of the architecture
school, it established a stricking difference with its
brick and glass context and perturbated the spatial
relationship of this daily passage, inviting by its
strangeness students to visit the inside.
Into the core of the inflat, a patio filled with fat-boys
was used as a chill-out place.
The structure, lightly inflating and deflating with the
people’s movements express the poetic of its singular
architectonic quality. The pictures were tied on nylon
strings and seem to float in the air,lightly moving with
the structure.
 Lectures during the workshop

Bellastock (FR) Büro Detours (DK)

© umschichten // Weigand und Lendzinski

Umschichten (DE) City Leaks (aus)

Aarhus Culture Night lecture
14th November 2011

«The Beer Crates City» project has been presented

during the Aarhus Culture Night.
 Beer
Crate
light
water
proof
e a s y
to handle Living pavilion // Ann Ha & Behrang Behin

Beer crate is a local

and traditionnal danish
material.
12.000 will be borrowed
from a local industry to be
used during Bellastock.
dk, 6.000 for the
ephemeral city and 6.000
for the urban intervention.
At the end of the festival
they will be given back to
their industrial cycle.

Information folder
Light, waterproof and
easy to handle, they are
usually stacked together,
as brick or lego, but you
can decide to use them
in another inovative way,
it’s up to you !
Bonheur provisoire // SHSL // Brussel // 33.000 crates Boxel - Summer pavilion // Detmold University // 2.000 crates

It gathers informations about the workshop, the frontal face

lateral face

top bottom

materials and their characteristics, the urban

strategy and a collection of beer crates projects with
technical details.
Sent to the participants, its goal was to provide
them inspiration and references about this unusual
construction element.

Light Pavilion P l a y m o
A t e l i e r S t e p o s i t

Information folder’s pictures Kempe Thill C i t y _ L e a k s

SHSL, Bonheur provisoire

Ann Ha & Behrang Behin, Living pavilion
Atelier Kempe Thill, Light pavilion
City_Leaks, Steposit, Playmo
THINK GLOBAL, ACT LOCAL

An international workshop
Bellastock gather every year more participants and among
them the foreigners part keep on increasing. In Denmark,
participants came from Spain, Italy, France, Norway,
Ireland, Latvia, Germany and international guests has
been invited for the lecture.
The success of this first abroad edition opened the way
to a new international dimension for the festival. Thus
other Bellastock are in preparation in Stuttgart, Madrid,
Stockholm and Chile.
These actions prove the actuality and the common
interest, all around the world, for the problems Bellastock
points out.

A local action
Participants
However, the goal is not to repeat a Bellastock everywhere.
France Paris, Clermont-Ferrand
As each architectural project, the pertinence of the action Spain Madrid, Roma
results from the understanding of each new context Germany Hamburg, Stuttgart, Hannover
(spatial and social), and from the translation of the Denmark Copenhagen, Aarhus
festival’s principles to this one. Latvia Riga
Ireland Dublin
Furthermore, each place has local problems, materials
Norway Oslo, Trondheim
and way of living which can give many new scenarios Iceland Reyjavik
unrealizable in France.
In Aarhus, we used and re-used local material as the beer Guest
crate or stone paper but also social structures. As example,
Umschichten Stuttgart
the food was made by the collective «Folk kitchen» and City_Leaks Sydney/Vienna
all the materials were given to local associations after the Himmelhaven Aarhus
festival. Büro Detours Aarhus
PREPARATION
The team and some volunteers prepared the
layout of the city the day before the workshop
starts. The palets are used to make the floor of the
city.

Each team has a plot of 16 palets and 330 crates.

7.200 crates and 240 palets will be downloaded in

one day.

5.000 crates and all the palets gonna be used for

the layout of the city.

During the whole workshop, around 10.000 crates

and 300 palets will be used before to be given
back to their industrial cycle.

One full truck contains 1.800 crates and 60 palets.

THE BEER CRATES CITY

Participants built together an ephemeral city made

of beer crates that hosted them during the festival.
Faced with this unusual material and after several
experimentations, they made in one afternoon some
shelters able to provide the basic needs ; protection
from the wind and the rain.
We were all surprised by the facility of construction
that allowed the beer crate and excited to see a small
city raising up in a few hours only.

During the second day, participants improved their

constructions, worked on the watertightness of the
roof, developed the public space with lights and
planted furnitures, built some new dwellings and
facilities as a bar, a covered stage, and a game area...

This constructive interest kept on untill the end of

the festival and highlighted the succes of the city’s
appropriation by the participants.
 Urban planning

To push participants to design their own city, no streets or

square have been designed on the master plan. Only a grid
of palets, 16 palets by team of 5. The public space appeared
as the residual space of the constructions. To obtain a
well-working city, teams had to share and explain their
intentions and ideas between each other.
20% of public space

We asked participants to provide around 20% of their

parcellar and materials to the public space.
Thus the skin of the constructions plays a double game.
On one side it protects the inhabitant from the outside and
defines a private perimeter, on the other it welcomes the
citizens and increase the social interaction into the city.
URBAN ACTION

Beer Crates Pavilion

Once the city established, participants built a
pavilion in the park in front of the City Hall, a
building designed by the world famous danish
architect Arne Jacobsen. It was the occasion to
work together on the direct recontextualization of
the material into an urban context facing the most
famous building of the city.
The pavilion is constituted by 2 squares.
From the outside it looks massive. Coming closer,
we can guess through the outside walls what is
happening right behind.
The gaps in between are fit out with planted crates
and form seating areas. Some speakers set into the
corner spread poem and relaxing sounds. Passer
by have a view on the core and the outside of the
structure.
Once into the core, a small exhibition about
Bellastock shows to the citizens the beer crates
city that has been set down one week before the
pavilion. There is no visual relation with the outside
except by the big openings that frame the tower of
the city hall, which appears as only city landmark.
Structure

The wall separate the inside

from the outside, it carry nothing
but itself. It is the structure. It
structures the space.

Spaces

Three spaces, three atmospheres.

The in-between links the core and
the outside that are disconnected.
The simplicity of the geometry
divide the space and suggest the
passage.

Views

The layout of the crates forms a

dynamic and cinetic wall that plays
with light and views keeping the
best balance between stability and
lightness.
 The whole city has been set down in 4 hours !
DECONSTRUCTION It is due to the motivation of the participants, to the
simplicity of the construction process (crates and plastic
strips) but especially to the beer crates’ industrial qualities.
It allows to build quickly a light and various architecture
that respect its site.
These qualities let us imagine some interesting future
use for this material, especially into the emergency
architecture field.
 PARTNERSHIPS TEAM
BS.dk 2011

Darius Chambrin (fr) Christian Baastrup (dk)

Mathilde Smolarski (fr) Marius Costan (dk)
Pauline Diaz (fr)

Arkitektskolen
Aarhus
Credits
photograph : Alexis Leclerq (fr), Sylvain Adenot (fr)
and Camille Bastide, Darius Chambrin, Mathilde Smolarski

THANKS
Aarhus Festugen Anders Søndergaard
Aarhus municipality Bendik Herdlevær Stockert
Arkitektskolen Aarhus François le français
Büro Detours Kasper Kajgaard
City Leaks Mads Vinding Johnsen
Folk Kitchen Mathias Bæktoft Bentzen
Himmelhaven Peter Drechsler Poulsen
Institute for X Søren Hykkelbjerg Poulsen
spARK Yvonne Buer Iwana
Umschichten

Food Not Bombs ...and all the participants

 Bellastock Association

60, Boulevard de la Villette

75019 Paris
France

+33 (0)1 53 38 50 76
contact.bellastock@gmail.com

www.bellastock.com
www.bellastock.com/blogbellastock/