Gothenburg City Hall at Gustaf Adolfs Torg consists of two parts. The older part dates back to the 17th century and the extension from 1936, designed by Gunnar Asplund, architect and professor of architecture at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology. The extension is one of Asplund’s most important works and is appreciated worldwide. In this newsletter you can go for a walk inside the building where every little part has a purpose.Click on the pictures to view them in a larger format with all the details.Enjoy!
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NEWSLETTER 20



One of the world’s most beautiful building extensions

Gothenburg City Hall at Gustaf Adolfs Torg consists of two parts. The older part dates back to the 17th century and the extension from 1936, designed by Gunnar Asplund, architect and professor of architecture at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology. The extension is one of Asplund’s most important works and is appreciated worldwide.
 
In this newsletter you can go for a walk inside the building where every little part has a purpose.

Click on the pictures to view them in a larger format with all the details.

Enjoy!


Ignored the conditions and won

In 1885, the city of Gothenburg found that the existing city hall had become too crowded and had also begun to decay. Discussions were conducted regarding a demolition to accommodate a new building. After 27 years of investigations, an agreement was made to rebuild and expand the building via an advertised architectural competition.

Gunnar Asplund won the first prize for a proposal which took no account whatsoever of the facades of the existing city hall. On the contrary, Asplund himself wrote: “the present facade formation from the 19th century, which is not particularly beautiful, the author felt he did not have to consider ...”.
 
The entrance is via a staircase through the three portals of the old city hall, which through a covered courtyard leads onto a paved courtyard. It is surrounded in three directions by arcades and to the north there is a glazed wall on two floors, through which you can see into the large hall of Asplund’s extension.


It resembles a southern bathing hall

One critic has said that “the interior is a work of art, but it does not have the character of a courthouse but more like a southern bathing hall. In a place where people are waiting for their verdict, and are burdened with worries, the character should be more serious, heavier, more closed.”
 
But Asplund’s intention was consciously the opposite. “Simply because people are filled with concern and anxiety, a friendly, kind and sunny light has been let in.”
 
The floor of the grand hall has the same kind of marble as the paving in the courtyard, which blurs the boundary between inside and outside. The walls are softly pivoted and clad in wood paneling, where the public appearance is blended into an everyday tone.

 


A stairway with thought

A flat staircase leads up to the second floor. Asplund's idea was that the stairway should lead to reflection, as it forces the visitor to slowly move up.


 


Original luminaries have been replicated

Parts of the lighting in the main hall is derived from the “clover lamps”, that, like the scales of The Goddess Iustitia, are hanging on each side of the iron beam pillars. These original lamps, along with the building’s other lighting, are today being produced by the lighting firm,
Blond Belysning.

 


The original Asplund hall is still intact

Upstairs are the meeting rooms, all of which have the same layout when it comes to furniture and decor. Due to the variations in natural daylight and the various woodwork in furniture and wall panels, all rooms are still different in nature.
 
The Asplund hall below is the only room in the building that is still original, without modern lighting or new technology.

 


Master of everything large and small
 
Asplund also designed all of the decor, furniture, luminaires and textiles, both in the extension part and in the converted older part of the city hall. A way of working that became his signature style, which is an unusual privilege for many of today’s architects. Everything he did was well thought through - from the door handles to the whole building’s relation to the surrounding area.
 
If you look closely, or click the image to make it larger, you’ll see that the chairs on the podium are slightly different in height. Each chair slants from the center, giving the centrally placed judge extra stature in the hall.

 


Erik Gunnar Asplund (1885-1940)

During his short life, Gunnar Asplund, like no other, succeeded in putting Sweden on the architectural map. His style of architecture was Nordic Classicism, sometimes referred to as Swedish Grace. Internationally, Gunnar Asplund is often described as a humanist who never designed architecture for any self-purpose. But clearly, he worked with a strong interest in how people would use and recognize his work.
 
Some of his most significant works, in addition to the extension of Gothenburg City Hall, are the Stockholm Public Library, the Skandia cinema and the exhibition pavilions at the Stockholm International Exhibition in 1930.
 
Together with his colleague Sigurd Lewerentz, he worked, from 1915 until his death in 1940, with The Woodland Cemetery in Stockholm. The cemetery is one of the most important in modern works of architecture and has been on UNESCO’s World Heritage List since 1994.

Read more about Gunnar Asplund and his work here.


Amendment – Arco was first

In my last newsletter, with a report from the Milano furniture Fair, I wrote that MDF Italia was first to manufacture a super slim tables in 2009. But the original was made 2006 as a birthday present for the 100year jubilee of Arco from Holland. Arco Asked 12 designers to design a piece of furniture that would take the furniture company into their next century.

Bertjan Pot first Idea was to make something impossible. With the Slim Table made of a sandwich construction in thin layers of tree veneers cover a lightweight honeycomb-structure of aluminum fulfill his mission and created a modern classic piece of furniture.
Lasse Olsson Photo photographs architecture, interiors, and lighting. My newsletter is published 6-8 times a year. It presents photographed projects and reports from furniture fairs in Stockholm and Milan.

You can read my previous newsletter om my website. Click Here!