A
Shifting grounds
Name
Freya Christina Mathilde Jørgensen
Education degree
Kandidat
Fagfelt
Architecture
Institute
Architecture and Culture
Program
Political Architecture: Critical Sustainability
Year
2026
The project works with the social and political undermining caused by coal extraction in Karb, Poland. By proposing a communal bath complex utilizing geothermal water from the mines, the project combines bathing and public assembly, creating grounds for political agency. The bath complex connects the underground and overground, while linking the past to the present.
Karb is a small neighborhood in Bytom, originally built as a workers’ settlement for the coal mines. Over time, coal extraction has caused changes to the groundwater flows, affecting the geological structure of the ground. This has led to significant subsidence in Karb, where the surface has sunk by 10–25 meters. Although there are no active mines beneath Karb today, the ground continues to settle slowly over time. Today, Karb is a highly stigmatized neighborhood, often seen as being stuck in the past. However, its residents maintain a strong connection to the area’s heritage and mining history. My proposal for a communal bathhouse seeks to preserve this connection to the past while also pointing toward a new purpose for the future. The project takes its departure from the water in the old mines, which is naturally heated underground to around 27°C, becoming a stable resource for the community.
The water infrastructure becomes part of the whole neighborhood
Preliminary research: Illustrating the facade changing over time, along with subsidence
The Royal Danish Academy supports the Sustainable Development Goals
Since 2017 the Royal Danish Academy has worked with the Sustainable Development Goals. This is reflected in our research, our teaching and in our students’ projects. This project relates to the following UN goal(-s)
