There are only a few hours left until the first rehearsals takes place in B&W Hallerne, the temple for the Eurovision Song Contest 2014. Members of the press, including our very own wiwibloggers, and some of the delegations have already arrived in “Wonderful Copenhagen”, as DR and the EBU make the final preparations for the contest. The press center is ready, and Denmark waits to write history!
Earlier today, Copenhagen has been transformed into a Eurovision host city, with banners being placed in the main roads, and especially all the way through “The Eurovision Mile”. EuroFan Cafe has also done all preparations, and Copenhagen is now ready to welcome hundreds of journalists, press and fans for Europe’s favourite TV show.
Delagations from all 16 participating countries of the first semi final have begun arriving at Copenhagen. Armenia was the first country to arrive, while Sweden, Estonia, Latvia and other countries are on the way.
Photos: DR, Axel Hirsoux facebook page , SVT/Melodifestivalen
Inside the press centre, everything is ready to go.
Press centre photos: Andres Putting (EBU)
But things are slightly different on the outside. Our Wiwi is on-the-ground and snapped the following photos from outside B&W Hallerne. Apparently DR forgot to put an arrow leading to the accreditation centre, which led to all sorts of confusion.
Here’s what Wiwi Facebooked to me: “Several of us caught a public bus to the B&W Hallerne. When we got off we ended up in an apartment complex where hippie youths were smoking marijuana. They kindly directed us through this hole in a fence, which led to B&W. The giant concrete block may seem severe to some, but I think it’s kind of edgy and cool.”
Here’s what he snapped:
Billy Xifaras contributed this report from Greece. Follow him on Twitter at @bill_xifaras. You can also keep up-to-date on the latest Eurovision news and liking our Facebook page.
lmao’d at getting to the arena via a hole in the fence. I’m also convinced it’ll look better at night with spotlights and stuff. Plus you can easily write off the raw looking outside as going with the industrial look that follows its history.
@Fatima – I haven’t been on ESC, still. :/ But, maybe this was part of their “surprise” package. Everyone expects ESC to be glitzy from everywhere, including the outside of the hall, the Danes made the concept more raw and well, not funny, but you can’t argue about different concepts. 🙂
Years ago, on my way to USA, our airplane landed in Copenhagen, and it was one of the most beautiful sights I had ever seen in my life. From that point on, I only had positive thoughts about Copenhagen and now, looking at these pictures I almost feel angry and disappointed. It looks horrible from outside. This is not what I was expecting from Copenhagen at all. They could have done better. But hopefully the inside will be nice.
Hehe, spelled my name wrong there xD
Okey so if I get it right, all the danish people put outside was a huge banner with the logo on? 😐
Sorry Denmark, but you could have made the B&W Hallrene look so much better, it even makes Malmö arena look awesome…and Malmö arena looks shitty as hell..
Inside: AWESOME!
Outside: Mehh…
But im sure that you will make a great show anyway! 😀
Armenian Diaspora money 70 bln USD is more than Azerbeijan he he
Armenia must win Aram MP3 !!!
Looks terrible outside, but it doesn’t matter. At least they didn’t expelled any residents from their homes (Aze.,Baku) just to build new arena and haven’t spent tens of millions€ while a great percentage of population suffering from undernourishment.
Med – concept from the start to shaven arena outside ? Really ? I can’t believe in this idea. Faster I try to believe that Danish are lazy and think that looking arena outside is no important. Anyway, it’s not professional but its too late to change whatever.
Med and Mika, I wonder if you’ve been to events like this before ? People like to go outside, stretch their legs and breathe some fresh air. Especially in beautiful Scandinavian late spring weather. It doesn’t look as if that’s going to much fun on Refshaleøen.
I think that they did not made anything of the outside just because that was their concept from the start. So raw and not shaven from the outside, glitzy cool from the inside. 🙂
After all, it’s the inside that counts…
Outside it looks terrible. They should have painted arena, which still is like old factory and not place of host Eurovision. But stage makes good impress and it gives me reaction ‘ uff, great job Danish ! ‘. I hope that show will realize in amazing way, I don’t want situations which I remember from semi final 1 from Dusseldorf..