Sidewalk Magic – Wind Magic

The project SIDEWALK MAGIC explores moments of surprise for passers-by on their way through the city through interventions focussing on the perception of nature in highly sealed urban spaces. As the first trial implementation, the intervention WIND MAGIC was carried out in October 2025 in Hamburg city centre as part of the Hamburg funding programme "Verborgene Potenziale".

WIND MAGIC was planned and realised as a temporary installation on the end of the promenade at the Landungsbrücken, on the corner of Schaartorbrücke and Steinhöft, with a view towards the Elbphilharmonie. The location was deliberately chosen as a rather unremarkable and unwelcoming urban (non-)place in Hamburg city centre, which, through the intervention, temporarily provided impulses for reflection between nature, art and the urban environment in the sense of artistic acupuncture, highlighting the potential of this location. The project thus falls within the scope of the fifth thematic development goal of the Target Compass for Hamburg's city centre development: "Public spaces will be further developed as stages for city centre life."

The intervention used the typical breeze in Hamburg to draw the attention of passers-by to a random performative choreography of windmills, surprising them on their walk between the city centre and the harbour and encouraging them to pause and rest at this location.

The modular implementation of the installation allows it to be replicated at other locations in the future.

The project was carried out as a pilot project within the Hamburg funding programme "Verborgene Potenziale - Gemeinschaftliche Entwicklung der Nutzungsvielfalt für eine lebendige und resiliente Hamburger Innenstadt" (translation: Hidden Potential – collaborative development of diverse uses for a vibrant and resilient Hamburg city centre) and was funded by the "Zukunftsfähige Innenstädte und Zentren" (translation: Sustainable city centres and town centres) programme provided by the Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Building.