AART is a Scandinavian architecture firm established in Aarhus in 2000 by Torben Skovbjerg, Anders Strange, and Anders Tyrrestrup. The practice has grown substantially over the past two decades, now employing 300 staff across offices in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. The company expanded strategically through acquisitions, most notably the purchase of Norwegian firm SJ Arkitekter in 2018 and the acquisition of Mangor & Nagel's three offices in 2022, described as the largest transaction among architectural firms at that time.
AART operates as a full-service firm, tackling projects across public and private housing, commercial, cultural, health, and education sectors. The practice distinguishes itself through a multidisciplinary approach, employing not only architects and landscape architects but also construction engineers, anthropologists, and economists. This composition reflects the firm's stated philosophy of creating economic, social, and environmental value simultaneously.
Completed projects include Kulturværftet in Helsingør and Inspiria Science Centre in Norway, both of which have received international recognition. Currently underway are the Østfold Hospital in Norway and Campus Park Skara in Sweden. A significant recent commission involved winning a competition to transform Aarhus Municipal Hospital into a new university campus, a 110,000-square-meter development intended to strengthen the city's academic and cultural identity.
The firm has cultivated an unusual institutional practice: establishing a dedicated impact team comprising architects, anthropologists, and economists who revisit completed projects to document their social and economic effects. This systematic approach to measuring architecture's real-world consequences sets AART apart in a field typically focused on aesthetics and technical execution alone.
