fold

Architecture and interiors, Copenhagen.

Work Hospitality

Tolv

Nordhavn, Copenhagen. 2024. Built.

A restaurant with a long wall of glowing amber stone, large round pendant lamps of pale stone, an olive tree in the foreground and low grey banquettes.

The lit wall at lunch. The stone is onyx cut 18 millimetres thin and lit from behind.

Tolv means twelve. The chef serves twelve tables, once, in the evening, and wanted a room that does not change between lunch and dinner. We gave it one wall of backlit onyx, a floor of old tile and an olive tree that arrives each spring.

Twelve tables

A restaurant with one sitting and twelve tables can be planned like a house for a very large family. Every table is the same distance from the wall, every guest has the same view, and the staff reach each table with the same number of steps. The plan is therefore a loose ring around the tree.

The tables are round, 1,000 millimetres across, and are moved only to be cleaned.

A dim corner of a restaurant with a round table, a fluted pale wall panel, a curved concrete column and a large woven lamp overhead.
A corner table under the woven lamp. The fluted panelling is oak, painted white and lit from above.

The wall

The lit wall is the first and the last thing a guest sees. It is made of 60 panels of onyx, each 18 millimetres thick and backed with a diffuser, so it gives off a flat amber light without a visible lamp.

The same light does most of the lighting of the room. We added four low pendants over the bar and nothing else, and the dimmers are set once by the chef and locked.

A sunlit restaurant floor of patterned black and white tile, white spindle-back chairs around a pale table and two potted plants at a window bar.
The window side in the morning, when the staff lay the tables. The tiles are salvaged and about 90 years old.

The floor

The floor is salvaged cement tile, collected from a demolished dairy in Roskilde. There were not enough of one pattern, so we laid two in a repeating border. The pattern hides stains well, which is a practical gift to a restaurant.

The tree

An olive tree stands in a planter in the middle of the room. In October a florist replaces it with another from a nursery in the south, and the first goes to a school garden in Frederiksberg.

Drawings

Plan of Tolv Plan at floor level, with the harbour to the north. Scale 1 to 100. Rooms: Dining room and tree, Bar, Kitchen, Cloaks and toilets. Dining room and tree 120 m² Bar 25 m² Kitchen 25 m² Cloaks and toilets 10 m² 15 m 12 m 5 m N
Plan at floor level, with the harbour to the north. Scale 1 to 100.
Cross section of Tolv Cross section through the dining room, looking east. Scale 1 to 100. The roof is flat, with the eave at 3.8 metres and the highest point at 3.8 metres. Levels: Floor level, Top of lit wall. Floor level 0 m Top of lit wall 3 m Span 12 m Eave 3.8 m Ridge 3.8 m
Cross section through the dining room, looking east. Scale 1 to 100.

Materials

What the building is made of, where each material is used, and who supplied it.

  • Close photograph of pale oak veneer with a fine straight grain.

    Oak

    Fluted wall panelling and tables, painted white

    Ravnkilde Sawmill

  • Close photograph of terrazzo tiles, with small chips of stone set in a pale binder.

    Terrazzo

    Bar counter and the tree planter

    Gram Terrazzo

  • Close photograph of a brushed brass surface in a muted gold tone.

    Brass

    Lamp fittings and the bar foot rail

    Brøndum Messing

  • Close photograph of coarse, undyed linen cloth with a visible weave.

    Linen

    Banquette upholstery

    Lerche Weavers

  • Close photograph of a warm beige plastered wall with a soft hand-finished texture.

    Lime plaster

    Column and ceiling

    Skovlunde Kalk

Credits

Architect and interiors
Fold
Lighting
Lysmager Studio
Stone
Nordisk Natursten
Tile
Genbrugsfliser Roskilde
Builder
Havnefront Entreprise
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