Campus Development Hierarchy-free building design With a large lounge area, classrooms with glass partitions and shared offices for researchers, Building 324, the home of DTU Compute, provides lots of opportunities for informal meetings between researchers and between students and lecturers. “The step from research to start-up is potentially smoother in an open building.” The communal areas feature specially designed furniture groups, and are filled with the sounds of students sitting and working together. On stepping into Building 324, you are taken aback by the quietness. The building’s large open spaces are filled with students, who are sitting around the colourful furniture groups working away. Through the glass partitions, you see teaching in progress, and the building is generally buzzing with life. Nevertheless, it is surprisingly peaceful. Since its inauguration in 2013, Building 324 has been Michael Reibel Boesen’s workplace. He is a member of DTU’s innovation staff, and is the man behind ‘AppGarage’, a project for students interested in developing and commercializing apps. For him, the building is a special place to work. ‘The old building, 322, was a classic university building where everyone had their own office. Now several of us sit together, which greatly facilitates informal discussion,’ says Michael Reibel Boesen. His office is situated on the first floor, and he says there is a good mix of large, open areas and closed offices to which you can retreat when necessary. ‘In the old buildings, I always needed a reason before knocking on the door of the other researchers’ offices. I never did so just to chat. Here, it’s much easier and quicker to consult one another and bounce ideas off each other. Sitting next to someone working within the same field as you or some other interesting project can be very beneficial. It’s much easier, for example, to ask about an article they have just written,’ says Michael Reibel Boesen. Meetings between students and lecturers Building 324 houses both research and teaching activities, and Michael Reibel Boesen says that students often come to the building to work, even when they don’t have lessons. ‘Many of my students like coming here to work with their projects because they enjoy the company, and it’s a pleasant place to be,’ he says. According to him, day-to-day contact with the students has definitely improved since the move: ‘Hardly any students ever came to the old buildings. So it is a huge change that lecturers and students now work together. From my point of view, it’s extremely important for my work that I’m always in contact with them.’ Michael Reibel Boesen explains that, initially, his AppGarage project was also based in Building 324, but that it has now moved back to the old building. ‘It means that not as many people use the AppGarage office facilities as previously.’ According to him, it is much easier for the students to talk to lecturers in the new building, and this helps to break down hierarchies between students and teaching staff. ‘If a student sees me walking through the large lounge area, they sometimes come up and ask me about AppGarage or something else related to the teaching. I’m just much more accessible,’ he says. It’s very transparent—you can see everything that is going on. By Signe Kirkegaard Cain, journalist 09/2015 Transforming DTU 26
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