Liewood HQ | Norm Architects

The new Liewood HQ, located in a grand building on Blegdamsvej in Copenhagen, invites you into a warm universe of light tones and textured natural materials. With its original sloping ceilings and deep window niches, the space reflects a time when elegance and good craftsmanship defined the identity of architecture. By adding a monochrome, yet rich colour and material palette, the building’s five floors form the framework for an inspiring work environment filled with life,
changeability, and community.

Serving as the new headquarters for the international children’s lifestyle brand, Liewood, the space holds everything from showrooms to offices and creative studios. Minimalist, sculptural elements in the form of playful podiums, curved walls and selected artworks make for a stimulating concept, complementing and contrasting the children’s toys on display. The sensory universe leaves the curated products in focus and forms the ideal framework for knowledge sharing, while serving as a source of continous inspiration.

Through a voluminous elegance, the architecture in the house appears minimalistic and rhythmic; columns define entrances, wooden walls encircle meeting rooms, wide staircases are used as various styling environments, while podiums appear around corners.

The original entrance area on the ground floor has been preserved and carefully adjusted to meet the needs of employees and clients of Liewood. To contrast the smooth surface of the dark stone flooring, a statement podium covered in clayworks has been introduced to create balance against the large tiles, emphasizing the grandeur of the space.

The original staircase that runs from the ground floor and four floors up has been left unspoiled as an ode to times of elegance and good craftsmanship. Due to its prominent size, the surrounding wall is curved on both sides, adding a surprising element within the space.

Integrating thoughtful artworks has been a vital part of creating a stimulating atmosphere. Amongst others, the renowned Danish designer, Sara Martinsen, contributed with beautiful yet subtle works, adding warmth and enhancing the tactility of the space without demanding more attention than the items on display.

In the showroom on the 1st floor, we’ve created a warm wooden core for clients and employees to explore the curated Liewood universe in. The volume of the interior architecture stands in great contrast to the small scale of children’s toys on display – as a way to highlight each element. Moreover, the deep shelves allow for built-in drawers to hide away additional sizes and colors of the toy on display to avoid clutter.

In order to create cohesion within the showroom space, both the shelving and tables are bespoke, recognizing that there is no one- size-fits-all solution. These tailored compositions are lasting in that they’re not only made to serve their purpose but are also context- aware and well-integrated within the architecture, making them stand out and inflict a certain value to their surroundings.

The showroom in the middle of the building stands as an artefact from the industrial age – an old production hall with open areas, architectural columns, and an iconic skylight. Although the space was beautiful and almost iconic as it was, humans instinctively search for spaces that make the body feel bounded and centered, that incite a sense of safety and comfort, and encourage activity and thought. In architecture, we must therefore work with scale, fullness and emptiness in a way that embraces the human form. Hence, to create a space that feels comfortable and relates to the body, we’ve designed a wooden core, serving as a small-scale house within the space to make it more relatable and easier to inhabit.

Moreover, we designed bespoke podiums covered with clayworks to create small moments within the showroom. By keeping the colors tone-in-tone in a light grey nuance, we create a contrast to the warmth of the wood.

The wide wooden staircase is used as a stimulating styling environment with bespoke podiums, while also serving as a meeting point for the employees to gather during the day. By working with natural materials and colors, we create spaces and objects that engage with our ancient aesthetic preferences—that feel good, look good and that last—as the natural environment is our primordial home and our senses and psychology have been attuned to its elements for as long as we can remember.

As the space is normally styled with children’s toys, we wanted to counterbalance this with more calm and quiet elements. Minimalist, sculptural elements join the interior concept in the form of organic styling tables, playful podiums, and draped curtains—a house of voluminous elegance, conveying the story of Liewood.

The chosen objects and artworks challenge balance, being free and unexpected in their form, yet always with a fine and organic language that speaks to all our senses. By harmonizing tactile qualities, an object can engender intimacy—softening the border between internal and external, and inviting the human body to feel.

Serving as an office headquarters, the space of course has to fulfill a plethora of functions and needs. However, we find the most important purpose is to serve as the framework for collaboration, knowledge- sharing and a sense of community. So, in the effort to create an inspiring and versatile working environment, we’ve strived to not just create classic office settings but also soft and inviting meeting areas.

With lots of natural light flowing in through the windows, the softness of the selected furniture comes into its own right, while also urging people to sit down – either for a chat or to continue working within a new setting. Some prefer to work in a coffee shop or a bustling lounge, while others enjoy the quietness of a library or their own apartment. With this space, we hope to place all of these under just one roof, so that the employees can be productive wherever they are the most comfortable.

Staircases are not just connecting our homes in the most practical way; they can also be a sculptural and exciting architectural element.

Since the preserved staircase from the ground floor and up doesn’t continue to the top floor of the building – a smaller and homier space that we call 'The Apartment' – we’ve constructed a spiraling successor. Built in steel, it contrasts the warmth and tactility from the wooden flooring. Soft and light in color, timber steps were integrated to create a seamless and calm tone-in-tone universe.

In our noisy and cluttered modern society that constantly clamors for our attention, we can find ourselves craving quiet and simplicity. We therefore wanted to create a certain stillness within the space—and in our daily lives in general—a return to basic needs of shelter, utility, beauty and belonging, without the complexity. We get closer to this concept, by reducing design to its core essentials and through intentionally exploring its sensorial impacts.

Meeting rooms are a place for important decisions to be made, ideas to be shared, and collaboration to be strengthened. Moreover, having a quiet environment with minimal distractions helps the team focus and be more productive. By only separating the rooms from the rest of the office space with floor-to-ceiling windows, we ensure a natural flow of light, while also enhancing the spirit of togetherness in a way that doesn’t overhaul the need for quietness, which we find is ever more important today where people tap into meetings from all over the world.

The office space is kept in a light color palette that coincide with the products in Liewood’s catalogue of children’s toys, while also complementing the selected materials on the other floors.

The human mind has evolved to feel calm and content at the sight of natural colors, and this palette has the added benefit of transcending design trends. By working with neutrals, we've thus created a timeless work environment for the emplyees to be creative and productive within.

Architect & Partner: Peter Eland
Architect: Sofie Bak
Completed: Summer 2022
Client: Liewood
Location: Blegdamsvej 124, 2100 Copenhagen, Denmark
Total sqm: 2200