High above the streets of Copenhagen, upon the roof of a Victorian complex that once housed a prison, workhouse, and hospital, live the bees of Bybi. Today, this historic site functions as a shelter for the homeless, a facility for young offenders, and a former job centre, reflecting a continuous social lineage that founder Oliver Maxwell points out with meticulous care. Right in the centre of the city, that looks like an idealised vision of the modern social enterprise, ennobled by the architecture of the past, their home is a complex of Victorian buildings. From “agricultural backwater to industrialised agriculture”, was reflected in how they treated people, Maxwell says, denmark’s Victorian transformation. But this turns out to be a stylistic map of the city: each jar is from a particular street, with its own shade and its own taste, thanks to “the flowers people planted, the weather, the bees’ own decisions and choices”, as Maxwell puts it, small pots are stacked against a window in what appears to be a random formation.
Maxwell, the 48-year-old anthropologist who founded the initiative, describes Bybi as a constellation connecting time, work, money, and community. Between 40 and 50 volunteers pass through the collective annually, supported by a core team of 15 individuals who manage practical honey production and community events. Where the marginalised are brought in from the fringes and corporations stand waiting to help, where jobs happen but a lot of the work is done by volunteers, and where – this bit is important – a lot of time is spent discussing ideas, it’s a place of cottage industry in concert with nature. Which looks like a lot of things – a commune, a kitchen-table business, an art space, in the middle of it all is the collective. Long drapes in earthy colours frame the entrance to a space where volunteers jar honey by hand.
The collective maintains between 80 and 100 colonies distributed across the city on schools, municipal buildings, corporate conference centres, restaurants, and businesses. Together, these hives yield four to six tonnes of honey each year, which is distributed through various unconventional economic models.
Some honey is given away freely at festivals and weddings. Maxwell explains that honey serves as an invitation for individuals to engage as co-responseto ensure joint health, accompanied by a request to plant flowers for the bees. Other batches are sold in boutique delicatessens, through reverse haggling where sellers start low, or via flexible pay-what-you-wish pricing.
Maxwell originally arrived in Denmark in 2007 after working on forest protection in Vietnam and training social enterprises in Brighton. He established Bybi in 2010 with the initial intention of employing homeless and marginalized individuals. However, he notes that this approach failed because the lower half of the labor market has deteriorated, causing individuals to struggle within the standard market economy.
Abandoning mandatory job-placement agendas, Bybi transitioned to a voluntary model. The organization currently employs around five staff members, expanding during summer months, alongside diverse volunteers including disabled individuals who pack flower seeds to be given away for free. Aref Haboo, a 53-year-old Syrian Kurd principal beekeeper who arrived in Denmark in 2014, works alongside student volunteers like 26-year-old American Madeline Pugh, an intern at design consultancy Gehl studying awe components.
Haboo’s life outside the collective remains precarious, highlighted by a recent speeding ticket that threatened his citizenship application despite living in the country for 12 years with his family. Meanwhile, researchers like 34-year-old Anne-Louise Krogh Hornbech Jensen study the cooperative, noting that bees appear to recognize individual faces.
Bybi’s financial sustainability relies partly on corporate partnerships with organizations such as L’Oréal, which hosted hives at a distribution center and subsequently reduced grass mowing. Nicolas Hansen, a 27-year-old nature management student and volunteer, emphasizes that true rewilding requires prioritizing non-human interests.
The collective collaborates with artists and runs educational school programs, evoking a preindustrial era when households kept hives and communicated with bees. Alongside refugees and individuals on incapacity benefits, the project also attracts corporate burnouts seeking refuge from high-pressure market environments.
