Gert Wingårdh Libri

Gert Wingårdh (*1951) is Sweden’s leading architect, known for his imaginative spatial creations that excel in economic, ecological, and sociological aspects. His designs prioritize the needs of future users. This monograph features seminal essays by renowned architecture critics, analyzing the key elements of his work and documenting important buildings from his thirty-year career through text and images. Editor Mikael Nanfeldt, curator of the Röhss Museum of Design and Applied Arts in Göteborg, oversees a major exhibition of Wingårdh’s work, which will tour internationally after its debut at the Swedish Museum of Architecture in Stockholm. Notable projects include award-winning laboratory buildings in Sweden and the United States, the Swedish embassies in Berlin and Washington, various villas, and the recently opened Müritzeum visitor center in Waren, Germany.

Contemporary architecture is shaped by both local and global conditions, making its understanding multifaceted. Gert Wingårdh and Rasmus Wærn, a prominent architect and a renowned architecture critic from Sweden, explored this complexity by selecting around fifty key terms and concepts, such as Branding, Collaborators, Corporate, Desire, Future, Everyday, Ornament, and Wheelchair. This exploration culminated in a unique dictionary featuring humorous illustrations and original contributions from notable figures, including Denise Scott Brown, Kenneth Frampton, Massimiliano Fuksas, Hans Ibelings, Peter Blundell Jones, Vittorio Magnago Lampugnani, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Juhani Pallasmaa, Joseph Rykwert, Jaime Salazar, Axel Sowa, and Wilfried Wang. A standout feature is a text by Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk. This work invites readers to engage with the pivotal themes that define modern architecture, offering insights into its diverse influences and the interplay between local uniqueness and global trends.

How can architecture exist as an art form in an increasingly technocratic world? How can architects convert their designs into cost-efficient and economic buildings? In eight uncompromising projects, Gert Wingårdh presents his personal answers. The range of projects starts with simple tasks, such as a water tower and a bus stop. These are contrasted by the artistically designed Aula Medica of the Karolinska Institutet and the Naturum museum and visitor center in Gällivare in the north of Sweden, the renovation of the National Museum and the extension to the Liljevalchs Konsthall. An afterword by Mårten Castenfors, Director of Liljevalchs Konsthall, rounds off the personal comments by the architect on his projects, which are illustrated in great detail with hand sketches, photographs and drawings.

Bilingual edition (English/German) / Zweisprachige Ausgabe (deutsch/englisch) Gert Wingårdh is already recognised as the most successful Swedish architect of all time, but he is not representative of a genuinely Swedish architecture. The outgoing architect’s work on the national and international stage is too cosmopolitan and his architectural solutions are too varied for that, demonstrating a wealth of ideas and frequent surprises. Because he is untrammelled by a predefined style or a fixed theoretical or conceptual orientation, with every new design he succeeds in finding the most suitable architectural language and the ideal expression for the task in hand. In the interests of its users, he places great emphasis not only on the functional but also on the aesthetic and atmospheric qualities of architecture—and regards the ecological sustainability of his buildings as quite indispensable.

The architecture of Gert Wingårdh is reminiscent of Frank Lloyd Wright in its bright spaciousness, and the aesthetically pleasing details would be worthy of Carlo Scarpa. His buildings do not stubbornly adhere to one style but respond to the task in hand and the surrounding environmental conditions. Sweden's rich tradition of building with wood and a strong ecological awareness are combined with high tech expertise. With successful projects such as the school building in Nödinge, the control tower at Stockholm's Arlanda airport, the science centre in Gothenburg, Ericsson's office in London, and the chancellery at the Swedish Embassy in Berlin, Wingårdh has become Sweden's most prominent architect, heading his own architectural firm with offices in Gothenburg and Stockholm since 1977.