Dugnad has underpinned the culture of care and responsibility Norwegians have had as neighbours, national and global citizens for 800 years, which continues on the periphery in co-housing, civic and municipal collaborations and more. However, as the country becomes more individualistic, citizens are losing Dugnad’s value. Dugnad is also reflected across cultures globally in various placemaking strategies, including architecture dedicated to a more equitable society.

Dugnad Days, a participatory design project selected for the Oslo Architecture Triennale 2019, creates a story of commitment, shared learning and collective responsibility. Dugnad Days explores collective, bespoke processes of building resilience and the social sustainability of communities through participatory placemaking. By recalibrating the Dugnad tradition of collective work and mutual support with the local community of Sletteløkka, Oslo, with support from Bydel Bjerke, a process of co-production and co-creation with citizens is given agency to foster human and environmental wellbeing.

The project is led by architect Alexander Eriksson Furunes (former AA student), place strategist and founder of Urbanista.org Lucy Bullivant (AA Member), architect/photographer Mattias Josefsson and architects Maria Årthun and Sudarshan Khadka, with artist and graphic designer Gabriela Forjaz and Maria Cau Levy, architect and graphic designer Goma Oficina, sound artist Caroline Jinde and performance artist Tuoman Laitinen,

The Architecture of Degrowth, the Oslo Architecture Triennale 2019 is a call to arms to build alternatives to the unsustainable and unfair paradigm of growth, because human and ecological flourishing matter the most. Dugnad Days is exhibited in the Triennale’s exhibition, The Library, at the National Museum, Oslo, 26 Sept-24 Nov 2019. 

Find out more about the project on the Urbanista website or more about the Oslo Architecture Triennalie 2019