Activation Before Ground Was Broken
How do you bring a district to life before it exists? For Bergensmeieriet we developed activation and marketing concepts to build community and sales long before move-in. (The second part of a rare story of a job that never was)
About the project
Bonava is a leading housing developer in Northern Europe. Bonava develops and sells affordable and sustainable housing.
As part of the placemaking commission for Bonava, Nonspace developed the activation and marketing programme for Bergensmeieriet, the new district on Tine's former dairy site at Mindemyren in Bergen. Where the brand work gave the place its story and identity, this work was to bring the neighbourhood to life: in the public space, in the channels, and in the sales process towards the planned launch in autumn 2023.
A neighbourhood without residents has no neighbours to invite, no café to meet in and no everyday life to show. At the same time, around 600 homes were to be sold in a market where buyers had to imagine a community that did not yet exist.
The challenge was to move from segmentation to platform: translating three defined target groups into concepts that could create genuine engagement today, build the foundation for sales tomorrow, and lay the groundwork for a living neighbourhood the day people move in.
From the brand platform «Et nabolag formet i fellesskap», Nonspace developed a set of production-ready activation concepts, built around the principle that the place should be put to use long before it was finished.
At Nonspace our approach to placemaking activation and marketing is built on the belief it should reflect the real future. How we tell the story and show the plans of a built environment should also be what makes that happen. Small, temporary experiences that repeat, evolve and through greater engagement become permanent.
«Rom til:» was developed as a use model for shared indoor and outdoor space: a four-part model spanning open community events and resident initiatives to pop-up use for local businesses and private gatherings. The showroom combined an exhibition on the site's past and future with flexible community space, and bergensmeieriet.no was to serve as the digital hub for bookings, programming and sales.
Around this sat a full marketing plan: a kick-off event, a neighbourhood café, out-of-home and digital advertising, social media, content marketing and a PR strategy, positioned against each of the three target groups and ready to produce as needed.
The concepts were delivered production-ready to Bonava in May 2023, scaled for the sales launch that autumn. Bonava AB went on to sell its entire Norwegian operation, and the work followed the project through two changes of ownership: UNION Residential Development's acquisition of Bonava Norge for NOK 1.5 billion in June 2023, and OBOS's purchase of Bergensmeieriet in January 2024.
Such is the nature of large urban developments: long timelines and shifting ownership decide what finally reaches the world. Here is a case that shows the value of focusing ambition and possibilities of urban development, to carry it through the turbulence of mergers and acquisitions. Today Bergensmeieriet is under construction under OBOS.
