The students drove the process. CBS bought the police station. Together it became a house.

Four names, one place

Five days before the first email to Freja Ejendomme there was a visual identity. The mark is the building’s own silhouette: the curved gable with its chimney, set in lime green with the name beneath in dark grey capitals. The house existed only as an idea, but it had letterhead, business cards and a cover for the project description.

The domain studenthouse.dk appears on both the business card and the letterhead — ten years before it became the address for the association’s history. The name was Student House, without CBS and without innovation.

The day after a workshop with sticky notes on the wall, the four wrote a memo that was not an application. It was an attempt to put words to what the house should be — split in two: the dream, and the concrete needs. Signed as “students and steering group for Student House”. Three months before the first application.

“Et hus der sætter CBS og Frederiksberg på verdenskortet over faciliteter for studerende.”“A house that puts CBS and Frederiksberg on the world map of facilities for students.”The memo’s subtitle

The workshop the day before

The memo was not written at a desk. On 16 March 2013 the students stood at a wall of sticky notes under two headings: why, and what should be there. The next day it had been written up.

The time and process plan

Five days after the dream memo there was a plan. Sixteen weeks, week 9 to 24, from the first project meeting to a delivered project — with Easter marked as a pause. The association was already running project group meetings and steering group meetings side by side, three months before the first application went out.

The four principles

Here they carry different names than they do in June. The order and the wording shifted, but the substance is the same as what later became the house’s four values.

The concrete needs

Seventeen rooms, described before anyone had seen a drawing. Some stand in the house today under other names. Others were never built. The right-hand column shows where the dream resurfaces — either as a named room in the 2020 room schedule, or as a concept in the 2017 building programme.

A month after the dream memo the students stood in front of the CBS Board of Directors. The pitch argued not with enthusiasm but with numbers: the board’s own ten-year vision, figures from the ministry and the National Union of Students in Denmark, and a calculation of how little space each student had.

Space, as they calculated it

The international students

The figures came from the students’ union survey Den Gode Velkomst 2012 and covered international students in Denmark.

What the campus lacked

Less than two months after the pitch to the board the material was ready. Four students answered Freja’s listing with a complete package: an analysis of the area and the building, vision, mission, values, budget and a letter of support from the president. The title was CBS Student House. The words innovation and Station did not yet exist.

The first four students

Christian and Anne Marie had the idea. Nicolai and Anders represented the student union CBS Students and signed the material, but were not part of it beyond the first year.

The four fundamental values

The values were to be anchored in the building, its activities and its occupants. Four years later they were translated into the building programme’s six dogmas.

The need, as it was counted

“Jeg giver min fulde opbakning til de studerendes projekt, om at skabe et studenterhus tæt på Solbjerg Campus.”“I give my full backing to the students’ project to create a student house close to Solbjerg Campus.”Letter of support from the president of CBS, 2013

The purpose, as formulated in 2013

A unique house for student engagement and innovation in the old police station in Frederiksberg. A house where students and their ideas are met, challenged and developed for the benefit of our society.

From the outset the work ran on two tracks: the physical setting, in partnership with CBS, and the organisational setting — the organisation and the culture. The first move on the physical setting concluded with the opening of the house in 2020.

The phases are the association’s own. Each had a strategy, a practical focus and a form of organisation that grew from a volunteer project group into a foundation.

On opening day Christian Refshauge told the story back from the beginning. The speech is the most precise source for how the first days unfolded: who was sitting there, who made the call, and who got the mayor’s ear.

“Back to 2013, the last evening of January. Anne Marie Engtoft Larsen, Mads Svaneklink and I was enjoying a glass of wine after a Board meeting at CBS.”

Five carried most of the work. More than 200 students contributed along the way: steering group, fundraising, design requirements, site meetings, activities, operations and opening. Christian, Anne Marie and Mads had the idea on the last evening of January 2013. The next day Mads asked Freja Ejendomme for the sales prospectus. Four of the founders and two of the active students appear in the June 2018 planning application as the house’s steering group. The name board is added to as we go.

The name board

89 names are on the board. If yours is missing or wrong, write to [email protected].

The house rests on a chain of documents. Each defines something the next one builds on.

The partners