Home.Earth Nærheden

Setting a record-low benchmark for low-impact multi-storey housing.

At Nærheden in Hedehusene, EFFEKT, working closely with Vandkunsten, has helped Home.Earth develop a residential building that redefines what is possible in housing construction. With a pre-certified life-cycle assessment of just 4.73 kg CO₂e/m²/year, the project stands as the country’s lowest climate footprint for a multi-storey residential building of its kind. More than a built result, Nærheden represents a deliberate exploration into how far the industry can be pushed when ambition, collaboration, and innovation are aligned from the outset.

Conceived as an open block structure, the development is organised into three residential volumes, each framing distinct courtyard landscapes designed to support biodiversity and everyday sensory experiences. The material palette – centred on untreated pine and slate – engages both tactility and longevity, while reinforcing a construction logic based on renewable, low-impact resources. Beneath this architectural expression lies a prefabricated timber system of columns, beams, and modular units, enabling both precision and a significant reduction in emissions.

The project is shaped by a clear agenda: to test and advance new standards for how housing can be designed, built, and lived in. Achieving more than a 60% reduction in total emissions compared to conventional benchmarks – and up to 90% in construction emissions – Nærheden demonstrates that substantial reductions are possible without increasing costs. Instead, it points to a model where performance, affordability, and spatial quality are mutually reinforcing.

This approach extends beyond technical performance. The 158 homes are complemented by shared amenities, including communal kitchens, workspaces, and a neighbourhood house with guest facilities, supporting new forms of everyday life and social connection. Ground-floor commercial spaces further anchor the development within its local context, fostering a vibrant and integrated neighbourhood. With no deposits, low operating costs, and rents accessible to people on regular incomes, the homes show how cutting emissions, affordability, and quality can reinforce one another when aligned from the outset.

Central to the project is the collaborative model that made it possible. From the beginning, high ambitions were set collectively, recognising that meaningful change in the built environment cannot be achieved in isolation. By bringing together multiple architectural voices alongside a committed client and interdisciplinary team, the project became a shared platform for innovation. This collective effort enabled the team to push beyond established limits, demonstrating that when all actors align around a common goal, new solutions can move from experimentation towards implementation.

For EFFEKT, Nærheden embodies a core part of the studio’s practice: working through built examples to understand how the industry can operate within planetary boundaries, and how incremental advancements can accumulate into systemic change. As thresholds are pushed lower, the challenges intensify – but so does the potential for innovation. Nærheden stands as both a milestone and a starting point, informing the next generation of projects aiming to go even further.

The buildings are DGNB-certified to gold.