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Denmark to get new Hans Christian Andersen Museum

The Local Denmark
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Denmark to get new Hans Christian Andersen Museum
The museum will open in 2020. Image: Kengo Kuma & Associates, Cornelius+Vöge, MASU planning

Odense Mayor Anker Boye lifted the veil on the new Hans Christian Andersen Museum on Monday, promising a new attraction that will do justice to the Danish storyteller’s “great fame and completely unique fairytale universe”.

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Best known for works like ‘The Little Mermaid’ and ‘The Ugly Duckling’, Andersen’s fairytales have been translated into well over 150 languages. Over 140 years after his death, he remains “completely and without comparison the world's most famous Dane” in the words of Johan de Mylius, a renowned expert on the author. 
 
Boye announced that the financing of the new 305 million kroner project has now been completed, thanks in large part to the 225 million kroner provided by the A.P. Møller Foundation and 60 million kroner donated by the City of Odense. 
 
It was also announced that the new museum will be designed by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, whose firm is also tapped to design the new Olympic stadium in Tokyo. 
 

Image: Kengo Kuma & Associates, Cornelius+Vöge, MASU planning
 
“The winning project of Kengo Kuma & Associates is fantastic because it – like Andersen in his fairytales – uniquely manages to conjure up the big themes in the small things and to connect the local aspects with international ones: The new Hans Christian Andersen Museum adds new magic to the museum, new magic to the place – the new Hans Christian Andersen Museum adds new magic to Odense,” Boye said in a statement. 
 
 
Although the author’s childhood Odense home already serves as the Hans Christian Andersen Museum, the new project will focus more on the author’s famous fairytales. 
 
“Precisely the fairytale touch is lacking from the present museum, which concentrates on his personal biography. For that reason, one great wish is to create a new setting and a well-staged dissemination that does justice to his great fame and completely unique fairytale universe,” Boyer said on Monday. 
 
“I am sure that the new museum will make Hans Christian Andersen feel even more present and alive for the children and young people of the city, while I also expect the new museum to significantly boost the city’s culture tourism,” he added. 
 
The new Hans Christian Andersen Museum is scheduled to open to the public in 2020. 
 

Image: Kengo Kuma & Associates, Cornelius+Vöge, MASU planning

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