Sep 27

Sep 27 Redefining Hospitality — Q+A With Bjarne Hansen, Founder of The Audo

Far from a conventional hotel, The Audo is a contemporary meeting place where the international art and design community collaborate, experiment, and share stories. With a clear idea in mind, Bjarne Hansen, the founder of the Danish interior company MENU, began the journey to manifest his dream together with the renowned architectural firm Norm Architects and Nathan Williams from Kinfolk. Design, work-life balance, hospitality, and community are united under one roof, allowing guests and visitors to enjoy a broad range of offerings such as restaurants, café, concept stores, material libraries, creative work, and event spaces.

Located in Copenhagen's new waterfront city district, the transformed merchant house is the oldest in the former industrial port. Norm Architects led the transformation and chose to preserve the building's Neo-Baroque façade as an homage to the historic character. The interior resembles a collector's home, giving it an artistic expression with selected items from friends and the house's brand partners. As a local architectural landmark and a global magnet for creatives, The Audo manages to blur the lines between home and work environments in a unique setting.

Redefining Hospitality — Q+A With Bjarne Hansen, Founder of the Audo on Anniversary Magazine

We recently took the time to ask Bjarne Hansen, the visionary founder of The Audo, some questions about his ambitious venture, his definition of hospitality, and his vision for the future.

Magnus Høst (MH)

Bjarne Hansen (BH)

Magnus Høst: Since I have personally experienced The Audo, I can assess its distinctive experience compared to more conventional hotels. What are you looking to create with this new venture, and what makes The Audo so different?

BH: The idea with The Audo was not only to do a hotel but also to create an oasis based on many different activities. It actually started with a vision of revitalizing the concept of a showroom. We asked ourselves how we could develop this new space with all the different brands involved to be the most inspiring and engaging representative for each brand. This involvement counts for everything within the entire hotel from the wooden floors, tiles, the beds, cutlery, sculptures, drapes, etc. We see The Audo as a multifunctional showroom established by brands sharing the same values and targeting like-minded creatives. The multifunctionality comes to life through our ambition of merging the hotel with a restaurant, café, auditorium, work-space, library, shop, and not least, the vibrant courtyard into one coexisting environment for both guests and visitors from nearby and beyond. We wanted to create a multifunctional showroom for brands and an exciting space for people.

MH: From the idea to its realization, I imagine that it must have been a long and challenging process. Can you tell us a bit more about the different steps which made The Audo come to life?

BH: Nordhavnen in Copenhagen is a former industrial harbor area currently developed into a wholly new and vibrant neighborhood. Its industrial history, combined with the waterfront, will dictate the urban environment. Because of thought through master planning, the area will be, and somehow already is, a place where work-life and leisure creates a unique neighborhood benefiting everyone who either works, lives, or visits the area. Together with Jonas Bjerre Poulsen from Norm Architects, we saw these potentials emerging. The masterplan carefully curates the entire ground floors within all buildings, ensuring that the attractive real estate contains various functions creating a perfect mixture of artists' workshops, cafés, restaurants, design shops, grocery stores, etc. Luckily, we could get our hands on an existing building because we jumped on board very early on. Rich in history, the building is actually the oldest in the entire neighborhood, and from here, we had almost free hands to outlive our ambitions — as long as we kept the exterior and structure intact.

MH: Can you enlighten us on the actual meaning of the Latin phrase, Ab Uno Disce Omnes meaning "from one, learn all"?

BH: Nathan Williams, the former Creative Director of Kinfolk, and I discussed for quite some time what would be the core experience when people are visiting The Audo. Personally, one of my biggest inspirations is the concept of TED Talk, and especially the famous talk by Simon Sinek titled "Start With Why" because I had a vision of a place that would cultivate people to come and learn through dialogue and exchange. Then Nathan interpreted these thoughts into a poetic Latin phrase that encapsulates the essence of what The Audo is. Either people learn from us, from people they meet here or teach us new things.

“from one, learn all”

MH: The Audo unites a design, work-life balance, hospitality, and community under the same roof. What does it mean for The Audo to be considered a multi-experience destination?

BH: We wanted to create an inspiring, welcoming, and holistic space for like-minded creatives such as designers, architects, and artists. A natural extension of your own home or even office. Here, you can rent a meeting room, enjoy a lunch in the courtyard as part of a family come-together, or just pass by on your way home to check out the new arrivals in the store. It has to be a place where both long and short term experiences can flourish.

MH: It seems to be very important for The Audo to cultivate interactions and connections. Have you experienced any specific moment that somehow encapsulated this?

BH: I remember that only one week after our opening, I met this Canadian architect, who had read about The Audo and our ambitions. Immediately he bought a ticket so that he could experience it firsthand. At the same time, one of our other guests, a man from Australia, had told me a similar story of why he was accommodating here. Because of their shared story and passion, I introduced them to each other, they grew a relationship and ended up extending their stay. This togetherness, connection, and the home-like warmth of The Audo is precisely what I hoped the essence of this space to be.

MH: When you enter The Audo, you instantly feel at home. How does The Audo achieve this feeling for both their visitors and overnight guests?

BH: We're far from a regular hotel — and we tell our guests that as soon as they arrive. They can't expect five-star service, but what they can expect is to feel at home. We can set up and arrange meetings, you can enjoy an elegant dinner at the restaurant and then bring the wine to your room without any concerns, as well as inviting people to come and visit you. There's no service during nighttime, but as an overnight guest, you can roam around the entire building and, for example, grab some food from the fridge. In that sense, there are no limitations — and this limitless responsibility adds a distinctive feeling of being home.

MH: Considering that the experience economy is one of the fastest-growing economies, although heavily challenged because of Covid-19, what tendencies do you see currently shaping the hospitality industry?

BH: The pandemic situation is a massive challenge to the experience economy and the hospitality sector. Although, as I see it, the small scale operation like The Audo is emphasizing a general trend of small and independent hotels emerging. Likewise, The Audo is founded on a collaborative approach consisting of twenty brands, making it much more sustainable when persistent and global crises like the Covid-19 appear. In the future, I think we will see collective concepts like The Audo much more.

MH: How do you imagine The Audo to evolve during the next ten years?

BH: With our mission to continually develop new collaborations and with the brands involved, you will, if you visited The Audo every year, always experience it differently. It's a very progressive space. It will only coexist even more with the neighborhood as it develops, creating an oasis of creativity and inspiration situated in the center of Nordhavn, Copenhagen.