Brumleby

Facts

Medical association housing

By Niels Jul Nielsen, Ph.d. i europæisk etnologi (6 stories)

" In 1853, Copenhagen suffered a cholera epidemic. Afterwards, it was clear that something had to be done about public health in the capital. The Danish Medical Association raised funds to build a row of inexpensive, but sanitary, dwellings for the general public out on the greenfield land of Øster Fælled. The architect was Michael Gottlieb Bindesbøll. Through the 1850s and 1860s, some five hundred flats were built. They were small, but with light and air between the buildings. Brumleby, as the estate was called, blazed a trail in modern social services; the residents had their own cooperative store, library and a community centre. "

Partly a public place

Selected entry

Slum's fight for survival

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Story written by Niels Jul Nielsen

Time / Periode 1853 1857

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When we got a flat on the Brumleby estate [in 1958], my father was afraid to tell his workmates at the Nordhavn shipyard", said one resident of the estate. By its centenary, Brumleby had only a bad reputation as a near-slum of crime and poverty. The local authority wanted to replace the buildings with modern housing that would attract better tax payers. But the residents were called to arms by the repeated demolition threats through the 1970s and 1980s. After sustained protest by a united neighbourhood, the buildings were preserved. From 1990 to 1996, the Brumleby estate underwent extensive refurbishment in consultation with the residents. Together with the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek and Øksnehallen, in 1997, Brumleby received the Europa Nostra Award for conservation and refurbishment. "