NLA - Waterfront London

The new exhibition at the NLA is called Waterfront London - rediscovering the rivers and canals of the capital.
The exhibition has great models and interesting facts about the the Thames and other rivers around London. It shows examples of developments that have been carried out or will happen in the future along the riverfront.

One of the most important things that the exhibition brings to light is the importance of the Thames and riverfront as public open space and how today it is not as beautiful or active as it used to be. And that this is something that has huge potential and should be fulfilled.

As an landscape architect student this is interesting and great. I love the opportunity to work along any kind of water and the Thames is obviously a fantastic resource of water.

The challenge is today greater than ever, with increasing flooding and climate change to consider. The Thames barrier has over the last few years been used a lot more than thought when it was built in 1982 and we all know that the Thames barrier will not be enough for the future.

So future developments need to consider flooding and try to find solutions for this.

The other challenge is to protect the Thames for its biodiversity. It is the largest continuous natural habitat in greater London. The heavy rainfall and flooding is causing the sewer system to discharge into the Thames and the Lea river when it becomes overloaded to save properties. This has severe consequences for ecology.


Some of the developments that i am looking forward to is Battersea Reach, King Cross and Venture Xtreme Surf Centre.

Model of Buro Happold and Grant Associates bid for one of the Olympic sites.

College Roundabout - Kingston

The first project this semester was to create a temporal installation / sculpture at one of the gateways to Kingston.

I immediately knew that I wanted to do something that involved the whole roundabout and not just a sculpture placed in the middle of the roundabout.

I looked at the shapes of the roundabout and thought of simplifying and making it more natural and soft. But also wanted to bring some kind of sustainable aspect to it. Since this is something I am really trying to bring across to all designs this year.

The end result is green, bold and subtle at the same time. And would look great and is achievable!

Walk on cold Winters day in Sweden

Went for morning walk around where I grew up in Sweden. It is called Norrviken and is located north of Stockholm (twenty minutes train ride from central Stockholm). Even if that is about the same distance as I live outside London now, it is very different. I guess since Stockholm is not as big, you actually get further out in the country quicker.

About 10 minutes walk from my house where my dad still lives there is a nature reserve, with a lake and a forest and fields. It s great for walking, mountain biking, running and maybe some cross country skiing in winter if you are lucky.

The photos are showing kind of a wetland walk through reeds at the edges of the lake. It has got a simple timber walk way through it and you feel really good walking trough the reeds. It shows how simple landscape can work.

Vasa parken - Stockholm

When I went home to Sweden for an early Christmas, I took the opportunity to visit a park in central Stockholm. The park is called Vasa parken and has had some updating over the past years and there is still some work going on. What I knew before I went was that they have these very cool trampolines for kids to play on. I thought they looked great when I saw photos of them and I wasn't disappointed. They were great and we had to try them of course.

I thought maybe they would stand out to much and break up the traditional park too much. But I actually think they were great and the colour looked perfect on a very cold winters day. There some kids in quite different ages playing on them when we were there. The rest of the park is very traditional and very Swedish. It is surrounded by old beautiful houses. You could see that some parts have been done up, but there are also a lot of elements kept in the park, which retains the character of a very old park with a history.

I like the ice rink, with the seating platforms on one end. Which probably is used for football during the summer and spring. There were kids skating on it. It is all free and the kids just bring their own skates. That is something I used to do when I was growing up and I love the fact that you can still go out and do that. And in central Stockholm all for free. It really encourages kids to play outside, even if it is cold and dark outside. It is still safe as well.


I really like the fact that the park is so Swedish and that the character of the park has been kept through regeneration. If the park looked great on a cold winters day, I think it will look beautiful on a summers day.