The Design Capital Idea and What the People Who Actually Live Here Think About It

Copenhagen has been called the most liveable city in the world by various indices for a decade. It has also been called the design capital of Europe, the happiest city on earth, and the sustainable city of the future. These descriptions are not wrong exactly. They describe something about the city that exists. They leave out the part where this version of the city was built on top of something that was here before and not everyone who was here before could afford to stay.

The design culture is real: there is a specific visual intelligence in Copenhagen — in the architecture, the public furniture, the cycling infrastructure, the way the waterfront has been developed — that you notice when you arrive and stop noticing after a year because you have adjusted to the standard. The Danish Design Museum (designmuseum.dk — Bredgade 68, Indre By) is the institution for understanding where this came from historically.

What the design capital designation misses: the people doing the design work often cannot afford to live near where they work anymore. The studios in Kødbyen are occupied by people who commute from Amager or Frederiksberg or further. The creative class that built the reputation of the city is the same creative class being priced out of it — a problem every desirable city has and none of them has solved.

The most honest version of Copenhagen is the one you see on a Tuesday afternoon in Nørrebro, not the one in the magazines. Go there. It is still a genuinely interesting place.