[3] In 1995 Henrik Valeur started out on his own making competition entries of which a few were awarded, including a proposal for a new entrance to Copenhagen Zoo[4] and for a new university on Amager (U97),[5] following which, in 1997, he founded UiD, a networking urban consultancy.

[T]his diagnosis becomes the frame for conceiving a new regional strategy that crosses the national borders of Denmark and Sweden, using urbanism as an integrating force”.

[10] In addition, the team organized a conference about the Øresund Region[11] and contributed a sound installation to an international group exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Roskilde.

[12] For the development of Trekroner East in Roskilde (2002–03), Henrik Valeur organized a workshop with groups of young architects,[ii] artists[iii] and representatives of various interest groups, the municipality, local citizens and experts, who worked together to design the landscape of this new part of the city - prior to the design of the buildings,[13] thus making it a practical example of landscape urbanism and of a participatory and collaborative planning process.

[24] The curator and his team[vii] wrapped the exterior of the Danish Pavilion in a green scaffolding, often seen on Chinese construction sites, and conducted a research project on problems and possibilities related to the processes of rapid urbanization in China, which constituted the background story of the exhibition, literally in the format of billboards mounted on the interior walls of the pavilion, with the project proposals developed by the four teams placed as free-standing installations in space.

[25] CO-EVOLUTION was awarded the Golden Lion for Best National Participation[26] by the jury of the 10th International Architecture Exhibition, Richard Sennett (President), Amyn Aga Khan, Antony Gormley and Zaha Hadid, who said:"We salute the creativity, intelligence, and generosity of the Danish pavilion".

[34] In 2010 Henrik Valeur gave the Le Corbusier Memorial Lecture in Chandigarh,[35] in which he noted that: “The problem with modernist architecture is not only that it tries to erase the past; it also obstructs the future!”[36]In the following years he worked with Indian students and researchers, activists and bureaucrats, developers and entrepreneurs,[viii] and participated in public discussions about the urban transition of India.

[45] The reasoning for both projects, i.e. to provide poor people in urban settings with opportunities to produce their own food and to create their own dwellings respectively, owes a debt to the Indian economist Amartya Sen’s capability approach.

[30] In a feature article in Politiken (2009) he argued that in response to climate change, i.e. extreme weather, sea level rise and stormwater etc., ecology and urbanity must be integrated.

[47] Ten years later, in another feature article in Politiken, he used Fredens Havn (Harbour of Peace), a spontaneously evolved and self-organized floating settlement in the central parts of Copenhagen, as an example of climate adapted living in the city.

[48] The book India: the Urban Transition (2014) provides a number of proposals, including the revitalization and integration of an existing system of water canals with a new network of pathways for pedestrians in the city of Bangalore,[39] the replacement of asphalt with natural surfaces, so-called green streets, in the city of Chandigarh and the use of plants and natural ventilation to create fresh air inside an office building,[43] in which the plants are also used as movable space dividers with the interior planning being based on principles of self-organization.

[51] Henrik Valeur introduced the concept of co-evolution in architecture in 2006 as curator of the project CO-EVOLUTION: Danish/Chinese Collaboration on Sustainable Urban Development in China for which he asked four young architecture offices from Denmark to work together with planners and researchers from four Chinese universities to answer the question: "How can China proceed with its ambitious project to improve living conditions for its population without exhausting the very resources needed to sustain a better life?

"[52][21] By creating a framework for collaboration between academics and professionals representing two distinct cultures, it was hoped that the exchange of knowledge, ideas and experiences would stimulate “creativity and imagination to set the spark for new visions for sustainable urban development".

It addresses basic human concerns in urban settings, seeing cities not as “dumb” machines but rather as sophisticated ecologies in which people are adapting to a constantly changing environment”.

^ Participating artists: Jonas Maria Schül, Ane Mette Ruge, Kerstin Bergendal, Katja Sander and Åsa Sonjasdotter.

^ Team members: Uwe Wütherich, Zhang Meng, Annelie Håkansson, Christoffer Pilgaard, Haydar Al-Khatib, Karin Lindgren, Lea Bolvig and Ma Liang.