The Centre of the North
The Arctic University Museum of Norway, Tromsø (NO), 2021
The university museum in Tromsø, Norway, is getting a new building. The high-ceilinged entrance hall is big enough for a whale skeleton. But what else should go in the museum?
Henning Larsen
The world’s northernmost university
The Norwegian city of Tromsø is home to the world’s northernmost university. It’s a regular educational institution where you might go to study law or medicine. But Tromsø is a special place. Far from the rest of civilisation, it’s the sole population centre amid hundreds of kilometres of Arctic landscape
An intensive workshop
Studio Louter’s content designers travelled to the far north for an intensive two-day workshop. With university museum staff, we studied current museum trends and worked on a concept for the new museum. The city's unique position was mentioned again and again.
The Centre of the North
We were inspired to develop the concept of the Centre of the North: a museum that would serve as a starting point for discovering the Arctic. It would be a place to celebrate a love of the region’s beauty. A place to explore the identity of a culture born out of extreme conditions. And a place to talk and think about anxiety: will the climate crisis spell the end of the Arctic as we know it?
The museum is now working on the further development of the Centre of the North.
Credits
Client
The Arctic University Museum of NorwayContent Design
Studio Louter