he Icelandic Symphony Orchestra, which has been in existence since the 1960s, did not have its own place to rehearse and perform. And Reykjavik did not have a concert hall on the scale of the capital city. Add to that the financial debauchery of Iceland’s early 21st century, and the result is a project covering a sizable chunk of the oceanfront just outside downtown Reykjavik. An idea on the scale of everything but the size of Iceland. The revitalization of the eastern harbor included the construction of a huge HARPA concert hall, a five-star hotel, a shopping street, apartments and much more.
The project was done in cooperation by two firms: the Danish Henning Larsen Architects (1) and the Icelandic Batteríið Architects (responsible, for example, for the expansion of the Icelandic Parliament building in Reykjavik). Artec Consultants from the United States handled the building’s acoustic solutions. And artist Olafur Eliasson designed the Harpy’s amazing facade. By design, the project was meant to draw from Icelandic nature and literally from materials available in Iceland.
