Reimagining Architecture's Relationship with Nature's Forces
Evolution from Festival to Biennial: A New Era for Copenhagen Architecture
Tracing its lineage from the 2014 CAFx festival, which evolved into the Copenhagen Architecture Forum in 2024, the initiative has transitioned from an annual event to a biennial. The inaugural Copenhagen Architecture Biennial took place in 2025, setting the stage for a more extensive and impactful series of events.
Unveiling the Theme: "Elements" for the 2027 Biennial
The second edition is scheduled to run from September 9 to October 15, 2027, under the overarching theme of "Elements." Following its predecessor's call to "Slow Down," this year's focus turns to the fundamental planetary forces that have historically been central to architectural endeavors, questioning humanity's long-held ambition to master and inhabit the natural world.
Challenging Modernity's Promise: Architecture's Role in a Changing Climate
The curatorial vision critically examines the modern ideal of boundless technological advancement, unconstrained by ecological, geographical, biological, or material limitations. Historically, architecture has been instrumental in upholding this promise, controlling factors like temperature, humidity, and physical contact with the environment. However, the organizers recognize that this foundational modern promise is increasingly untenable in a world grappling with rising global temperatures, pervasive air pollution, escalating sea levels, infertile land, and mounting pressure on vital natural resources. This evolving reality renders the aspiration of absolute control an undesirable future.
Designing with, Not Against, Nature: A New Architectural Ethic
The 2027 Biennial's theme emerges from this dual disillusionment, prompting a critical inquiry into how architecture can coexist with, build with, and plan with "elements," rather than against them, to sustain human existence. Key questions posed include: Which populations are safeguarded, and which remain vulnerable? What aspects of our environment should be preserved, and what must be permitted to evolve or decline? What novel forms of communal existence might arise from this revised perspective, encompassing daily habits, well-being, rituals, and collective care?
Curatorial Perspective: Embracing Dependence on Nature
Josephine Michau, a key figure in the Curatorial Collective and Director of the Copenhagen Architecture Biennial, articulates this shift: "For decades, architecture has promised us mastery over heat, earth, air and water. With 'Elements', we ask what happens when we stop pretending we ever had that mastery, and start designing from dependence instead? The buildings that will serve us best aren't the ones that shut the world out, they're the ones that let us feel it."
Event Highlights: Exhibitions, Symposium, and Open Call
The program will span Copenhagen's Cultural District and over 60 additional venues across the city. Notable highlights include four exhibitions that explore architecture's interaction with elemental forces, hosted at prominent locations such as the newly constructed Vandkulturhuset Papirøen by Kengo Kuma, Simian, Kunsthal Nord, and Halmtorvet 27. The professional symposium, "Assemble!," will concentrate on policy and regulatory frameworks that shape urban development, resource extraction, and consumption, building upon the inaugural edition's advocacy for new legislation. Following the acclaimed "Slow Pavilions," there will be another open call, inviting architects, designers, and researchers to submit proposals for new pavilions that respond to the "Elements" theme. Further details regarding exhibiting practices, pavilion winners, "Assemble!" speakers, and the comprehensive public events schedule will be released closer to the Biennial's opening.
A Vision for the Future: Architecture Rooted in Elemental Understanding
Josephine Michau, Founder and Chief Curator of CAFx and the Copenhagen Architecture Biennial, emphasizes the ambition: "With four exhibitions built around fire, earth, air and water, an open call for new public pavilions, and Assemble! Returning with a sharper focus on policy, the 2027 Biennial is our most ambitious attempt yet to make the elemental legible as the very ground of architecture itself."
Copenhagen's Global Context: A Livable City Leading Architectural Discourse
For the second consecutive year, Copenhagen was recognized as the world's most livable city in the 2026 Economist Intelligence Unit's Global Liveability Index. This urban quality of life is partly attributed to the pioneering work of Danish architect and urban planner Jan Gehl, whose 90th birthday is being celebrated at the Danish Architecture Center with a series of activities and an exhibition. Globally, other architectural events are contributing to the advancement of the discipline. The Sharjah Architecture Triennial (SAT) has released its "A Journey into Architecture Archives: Baghdad, Damascus, Tunis" documentary series online. In Chile, a gathering in Valparaíso aims to preserve traditional building crafts. Meanwhile, the 8th Tallinn Architecture Biennale (TAB 2026) will delve into the "True Cost of Architecture" with its theme, "How Much?," investigating the influence of cost, scarcity, and constraints on architectural productio