TREE.0

  • ABOUT THE PROJECT

    TREE.0 is funded by Realdania and developed by Alexandra Institute in cooperation with Danish Architecture Centre, Design Society, International Federation for Housing and Planning, Kraks Fond, Copenhagen Solutions Lab, and Gehl Architects. TREE.0 was developed in 2016-2017.

A data-driven installation in the center of Copenhagen

TREE.0 is an urban interactive installation created in collaboration with Copenhagen Solutions Lab, Danish Design Centre, Danish Architecture Centre and Gehl Architects.

In the first iteration, TREE.0 was placed 2 different places in Vester Voldgade, as a part of Street Lab – a sandbed initiated by The City of Copenhagen with the mission to try out new digital “smart” solutions. 

“Smart cities need thick data, not big data”

Anthropologist Clifford Geertz

 Throughout the project we tested design principles that adds to an ongoing discussion on how thick data can support the way people use the physical spaces in a valuable way. The datasets being gathered, was in realtime organised in different “clusters” (groups) and the installation reacted on the different connections that were being made. 

“The collaboration with Interactive Spaces Lab is an opportunity to complement the tools we normally use at Gehl to understand and document the interaction between urban space and life. Our partnership focuses on understanding how the city is used and new ways of using data to improve the quality of the urban spaces”.

Birgitte Bundesen Svarre, Associate Gehl

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TREE.0
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TREE.0 was the result of analytics, interviews and mapping of the area - overall showing that 1. There was a lack of playful activities for children families 2. There was a scepticism about how digital data could actually contribute with something positive to the urban space and 3. There was a lack of knowledge about the specific weather conditions in the local area. The installation was designed to fit in to a narrow space (like a corner) in Copenhagen, with references to nature and something organic. It was both equipped with different sensors, tagering local information about temperature, wind, humidity and air-quality and sensors showing patterns of movement in the surroundings.  
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The design of the installation were developed in a prototyping process, where the basic physical form draw on a metaphor of a tree. Trees has been a part of the urban environment for ages and is often seen as a positive and recreational object to most people across nationalities and traditions - this makes the reference to the tree interesting to us. With this reference the installation came to be a 6 meters tall digital tree, with a tree trunk and branches made of corten-steel. In top of each branch was a huge round fabric leaf, and light sources and a soundscape were adding life to the tree. It was standing on a round platform serving as a foundation and an interaction access point - where the users could move on it, tricking pressure sensors and affect the light and soundscape. During the prototyping a digital fokus served as focal point in transforming the installation. By using a variety of sensors, LED lights and ever-changing soundscapes, TREE.0 became a large-scale experiment on how we can use the data of the city to create a comforting and inviting urban environment. The tree was spreading an atmosphere shaped by the ultra-local data relying on weather sensors, wifi-sensing and pressure sensors.
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TREE.0 - an urban installation from Interactive Spaces Lab on Vimeo.

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