News

SUCCESS FOR HERITAGE: EXTENSION TO STOCKHOLM'S CITY LIBRARY STOPPED

oct 13

Europa Nostra contributed to its Swedish members’ campaign by writing a letter urging Sten Nordin, Mayor of the City of Stockholm, to save Stockholm's City Library - a European monument of Modern Movement architecture by Gunnar Asplund

Swedish news announced yesterday, 12 October, that the plans to extend the Stockholm City Library have been stopped, the reason given being that new cost estimates have come in too high. Europa Nostra Sweden thanked the International Secretariat and Executive President, Denis de Kergorlay, for bringing international pressure to bear on the City of Stockholm from our Europe-wide cultural heritage lobby.

On 5 October, Executive President, Denis de Kergorlay, wrote to Stockholm’s Mayor Sten Nordin urging the City of Stockholm to halt the current plan for extending Stockholm's City Library – an iconic masterpiece by architect Gunnar Asplund. The letter was distributed to relevant and interested parties, politicians and the press.
The impending threat to this unique monument of Swedish and European cultural heritage was brought to our attention by a group of Europa Nostra’s Swedish Member Organisations and concerned Individual Members. Europa Nostra decided to pursue at a European level the campaign to help safeguard this important European architectural monument.

The Stockholm library complex is a unique masterpiece of early 20th century architecture and town planning, for which Stockholm and Sweden are famous throughout Europe and around the world. Stockholm’s library features in architecture textbooks throughout the world as an icon of architectural history: it is of great interest as a forerunner of architecture of the Modern Movement, having been built during the transition period from modern classicism to modernism, and is also of great importance as the central feature of the surrounding architectural environment, built according to Gunnar Asplund’s plan for the whole area of the city. This plan included the main library building, the annexes and landscaping around them and the park towards the Sveavägen, and was designed with the relation to the Observatory Hill and the wider surroundings in mind. The interest in Gunnar Asplund and his works is currently growing worldwide.

In the present “Delphinium” extension plan, proposed by the competition winner, Heike Hanada, the library annexes would be demolished. These annexes are very sophisticated in their simplicity, purity and fine detailing, and are an integral part of the total urban composition. Their simple volumes are coordinated with the lower part of the main library building and in their restrained expression, they very successfully highlight the main building as the jewel in the crown.

The proposed extension would, apart from demolishing important parts of the Asplund concept, also diminish the Asplund library building, crowding and drawing attention away from it. It would form a massive glass volume behind the library and irrevocably harm the main views towards the site. The library building would lose original functions and turn into an annex in relation to the new building; the original main entrance, which is a key to the understanding of Asplund’s building, would become a side entrance.

Europa Nostra acknowledges the good intentions of the City of Stockholm to develop the public library facilities in Stockholm, and the thorough work that had been done to investigate the possibility to add new functions to the present City Library. The result of the architectural competition, with over one thousand entries, however, clearly shows that it is impossible to add the wanted new floor space behind the main building, without seriously damaging the cultural values of the existing library.

Europa Nostra therefore urged the Stockholm authorities to stop the current plans for the extension of the library and demolition of the annexes. Let the library remain the “book-temple” it is intended to be and restore it to its original splendour as one of the foremost library buildings of the world. We call for a reconsideration of alternative solutions and extension locations which leave the integrity of the Asplund library building and the surrounding planning unharmed.