Inflight Magazine of Brussels Airlines

Arty by nature

In Scandinavia, art and nature make a spellbinding lifestyle mix for all ages to enjoy, finds Tamara Thiessen

In Kongens Have, the King’s Garden in Copenhagen, a crowd has gathered for an outdoor marionette theatre production, catching bits of the show between dramatic changes in the weather. Far from being put off by nature, most have come prepared with umbrellas and waterproof cushions, and settle back into the production between downpours.

Within this urban oasis is a palace (Rosenborg Slot), a cosy café, chess sets, parasols, pavilions, Danish-designed public toilets and loads of children’s activities. This is a fairy tale world straight from Hans Christian Andersen, where a sculpture of his Little Mermaid welcomes visitors to Copenhagen’s Langelinie Pier, and the city’s parklands are packed with family wellbeing.

Danish aesthetics are grounded in nature. A few minutes stroll from the King’s Garden, the Statens Museum of Fine Art is a stunning hybrid of old and contemporary, brick and glass. Gaping vertical windows and atrium roofs soak up the scenery of the Østre Anlaeg park. In a feat of spectacular architecture, the original 1896 building has been linked with the futuristic new wing via the glass-roofed Sculpture Street, which sucks in every bit of available light.

“We really love to bring the outdoors inside, to be together with nature,” says Danish interior designer Lene Gruden. The whole time in the gallery, whether looking at sculptures or lunching at Café Lars Nørgård, you’ll find yourself plunging deep into the watery reflections of the parkland below.

Taking encounters with nature a step further, the Copenhagen Zoo has a Children’s Zoo where one of the activities is a Zoo School. Here kids get to have close encounters with animals, both literally and educationally.

Along the river, Copenhagen’s waterfront has been redeveloped into a chic cultural stretch, focused on institutions such as the Opera House. The architecture’s natural aesthetic taps into the port location as much as the capricious climate.

It is the incorporation of nature into Scandinavian art – coupled with often-brilliant transformations to let light into old buildings – which gives its galleries and museums so much appeal. Danes sign up to the club of the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art and use it much like they might a gym membership, for recreational and cultural workouts on the weekends. On the North Zealand coast, in an ocean-fronted park with views over the strait known as The Sound of Sweden, this modern art collection is housed in a 19th-century villa, progressively extended to maximise the scenery. The Louisiana’s concerts, café, children’s wing and outdoor activities make it a family outing, cultural event and nature pursuit in one.

Swedish style

In Sweden’s lively west-coast city of Gothenburg, the Röhsska Museet – Museum of Design and Decorative Arts – boasts an outdoor-artsy feel.

Every exhibit, from bucolic to futuristic, is inspired by the natural world. In the courtyard, the sweet little café Röhsska Kök serves coffee and hearty slices of apple cake and fruit pie with cream, to be enjoyed at trestle tables or on a wonderful big rock in the sun.

A few tram stops away, there are cafés and galleries aplenty in and around the Botanical Garden (Botaniska Trädgård) and the vast and wonderful Slottskogen Park – a virtual urban forest with lakes, a zoo and even an observatory. Apart from jogging and picnicking, you can visit the Natural History Museum or attend concerts at Villa Belparc.

In Stockholm, this relationship between the outdoors and culture – the kind found in both cafés and galleries – is intertwined like the roots of a tree. The Vasa Museum, on Djurgarden Island, is the most brilliant conversion of a salvaged historic ship. The purpose-built shell built around the 17th-century war vessel is asymmetrical and organic to the ship’s shape, and while viewing the incredible restoration, you’re strongly connected with the sea where it sank as every window looks out over the water.

The island is home to several other museums set among beautiful forests and lakes. Right at the end of a small headland is the Rosendals Trädgård, a café-restaurant, organic garden, greenhouse and bakery. The restaurant is perched on a canal in the Ekoparken, a national park of forest and waterways within – it’s easy to forget – a city.

Natural Norway

In Oslo, a trek up to the Munch Museum is the best way to get a feel for its wonderful location – in the hills near the Botanical Gardens with a stupefying view of Oslo Fjord. The gardens, the café terrace and the museum are all full of culture vultures, couples and families.
The look and feel of so many Scandinavian cultural sites widens their appeal enormously.

Even the somewhat quirky sculpture park, the Vigelandsparken, is a hymn to nature. The 212 life-size bronze sculptures – all the work of Gustav Vigeland in the 1930s – are laid out between rivers, pines and ponds. If you jog or walk the 3km from here back to the city centre, around the bay of Oslo, you’ll get an insiders view of the city’s incredible watery geography.

Cafés and restaurants in nature

Restaurant Kongens Have,
Kronprinsessegade 13, Copenhagen

The Botanical Pavilion,
Botaniska Trädgård, Carl Skottsbergsgatan 22A, Gothenburg

Café,
Rosendals Trädgård, Rosendalsterrassen 12, Stockholm

Café Edvard Munch,
Munch Museum, Tøyengata 53, Oslo, www.munch.museum.no

 

Hotels in nature

Copenhagen
Port-side and salty through and through, the Copenhagen Admiral Hotel (tel. +45 3374 1414, www.admiralhotel.dk) is in a sensitively converted warehouse complex, with simulated ice-breaker elevators, virtual oceanic audio experiences and chunky beamed lofts.

Stockholm
The First Hotels Group is native to Scandinavia and its deluxe properties are usually in historic or privileged locations, but with swish design elements, great in-house food and warm service. This is the case with the modern romantic First Hotel Reisen (tel. +46 (0)8 22 3260, www.firsthotels.com), a 17th-century building on the waterfront in the old city centre of Gamla Stan.

 

Gothenburg
While no design diva, the three-star Hotel Lorensberg (tel. +46 (0)31 810 600, hotel-lorensberg.se) is arty, calm and family owned and 64 of its 107 rooms are singles. If your yen is for a genteel touch of country greenness, check out the Bjertorp Slott Manor Hotel (tel. +46 (0)512 300 500, www.bjertorpslott.se), a magnificent art nouveau pile in nearby Kvänum.

 

Oslo
About 1km from the city centre, in a tree-lined street of the West End’s embassy district, the charming Comfort Hotel Gabelshus (tel. +47 2327 6500, gabelhus.no). is in an ivy-clad 1912 building that looks like an English manor from the outside but is decked out in traditional and modern Scandinavian décor within.

 

L’Art par la Nature

L’intégration de la nature dans l’art et le design en Scandinavie renforce l’attrait des musées et des galeries dans les grandes villes.

A Copenhague la nouvelle aile futuriste en verre du Statens Museum for kunst, vient se greffer au bâtiment originel de 1896 dans la perspective d’insuffler une nouvelle lumière dans l’édifice. De hautes fenêtres verticales et les toits de l’atrium absorbent le paysage du parc Østre Anlaeg. Le Musée dispose d’un département destiné aux enfants où sont organisés des workshops depuis le plus jeune âge, afin qu’ils “touchent les oeuvres d’art avec les yeux”, nous confie la Directrice Allis Helleland.

Le Louisiana Museum of Modern Art sur la côte nord de la Zélande, en surplomb du détroit du Sund en Suède, est un autre exemple d’intégration.

L’extension de la demeure du 19e siècle a été conçue en vue de donner une visibilité maximale au paysage. Avec ses concerts, son café, son aile réservée aux enfants et ses multiples activités extérieures, le musée est un lieu idéal pour une sortie familiale, dans une réelle découverte conjointe de la culture et de la nature.

Dans la ville suédoise de Göteborg, cette interdépendance entre les individus, l’art et la nature est particulièrement visible au Röhsska Museet, Musée des Arts Décoratifs et du Design, dans une exposition qui présente des chaises en osier, des chaises aux inspirations de champignons et des bottes en caoutchouc Viking de style new-wave.

Même sensation de relation intense avec la nature, lorsque vous visitez le Vasa Museum, un navire de guerre restauré du 17e, sur l’île de Djurgarden, à Stockholm. Ici, vous êtes en lien étroit avec la mer.

La vue imprenable sur le Fjord d’Oslo depuis le Munch Museum vaut vraiment le déplacement, la culture se découvre dans un splendide environnement. Nombreux sont les passionnés d’art qui déambulent en couple ou en famille dans les jardins, le café et le musée, attestant de la grande attraction des sites culturels en Scandinavie.

Kunst en natuur

De prominente aanwezigheid van de natuur in Scandinavische kunst en design maakt de musea en galerijen in de grote steden extra aantrekkelijk.

In Kopenhagen sluit de futuristische nieuwe vleugel in glas van het Statens Museum for Kunst perfect aan op het oorspronkelijke gebouw uit 1896. Immense raampartijen en atriumdaken brengen het landschap van het Østre Anlaeg park binnen. In de kinderafdeling van het museum leren zelfs peuters tijdens workshops “kunstwerken met hun ogen beroeren”, aldus directeur Allis Helleland.

Aan de kust van Noord-Zeeland kijkt het Louisiana Museum for Kunst uit over de Sont van Zweden. Ook hier werd de 19de-eeuwse villa uitgebreid om het landschap beter te integreren. Met zijn concerten, café, kindervleugel en buitenactiviteiten is het de ideale plek voor een culturele familie-uitstap in de natuur.

In de Zweedse stad Göteborg verkent het Röhsska Museet (design en toegepast kunst) de wisselwerking tussen mens, natuur en kunst in een speciale designtentoonstelling met stoelen in wilgenhout, krukjes geïnspireerd op paddenstoelen en moderne Viking rubberlaarzen.

Bezoek het Vasa Museum, een geborgen 17e-eeuws oorlogsschip op het eiland Djurgarden in Stockholm, en voel de verbondenheid met de zee.

Het adembenemende zicht op de Oslo Fjord vanuit het Munch Museum is elke inspanning waard. Een unieke locatie om van cultuur te genieten. De tuinen, het café en het museum zitten dan ook vol cultuurminnende koppels en gezinnen, het beste bewijs dat cultuur in Scandinavië veel aanhangers heeft.

Images Corbis, www.Photolibrary.com

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