What makes a city a good place to live? Danish Architecture Center explores that very question in Cities for People, a new exhibition developed with Gehl and Jan Gehl that looks at how urban planning impacts everyday life. Opened on October 5, the show offers examples of people-centred design across the globe, from Copenhagen to New York, and Buenos Aires to Shanghai, while also considering how cities are addressing present-day challenges including climate change, loneliness and unequal access to public space.

Visitors can test some of Gehl’s own methods for counting pedestrians, cyclists and cars, explore criteria for successful public spaces, and see how projects such as the transformation of Times Square, Copenhagen’s harbour baths and new public spaces along Shanghai’s Huangpu River have changed the way people utilize urban space. Other installations look at the city from a child’s perspective and ask what makes residents feel attached to particular places, bringing questions of scale, safety, play and belonging into the exhibition’s definition of a good city.