Etikettarkiv: university

Kvarteren Sappören, Dragonen, Sabeln, Bajonetten, Laddstaken

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Episodes 228 to 232 enter the district called Haga, Gothenburg’s first suburb that was burnt down by the Danes in 1676 but made a strong comeback until most of it was demolished 300 years later.

Episode 228: kv Sappören

District: Haga

Photo date: 26 February 2022

Our first block in Haga sums up the architectural history of the district quite well. It was a working class suburb which meant cheap or ancient buildings like the ones at Husargatan 44 and 46 from the mid-1800s. In the 1960s the powers that be decided that all houses in Gothenburg older than 50 years and esepecially every single landshövdingehus needed to be demolished and replaced with concrete machines for living. But the man in the street disagreed and their was much protestation, to deaf ears. In the 1980s, it was again decided that some old houses should be spared and refurbished, while the modern houses being put up should have a less brutal esthetic.

The university building in this block is part of what is now called Campus Haga and is part of the social sciences department. They were very affronted when their new area in Haga was immediately, nay inevitably, dubbed ”Samvetet” by the local wits – ”social sciences” is called ”samhällsvetenskap” in Swedish, and ”samvete” is ”conscience”. Oh ye of little humour… The buildings were designed by Arkitektlaget and the Wallinder bureau and put up in the early 1990s.

Episode 229: kv Dragonen

District: Haga

Photo date: 26 February 2022

The Dragoon is much like The Sapper but instead of a mid-1850s cottage, the preserved houses are two 1880s landshövdingehus, from the first wave of that type of house. For the new university building, the architects strived to retain the monumental backdrop that the old brewery gave to Vasagatan. Well at least it is rather low; today the new house would have been at least ten storeys high and inescapable.

Episode 230: kv Sabeln

District: Haga

Photo date: 12 March 2022

Haga Nygata is the main (the only) shopping street in Haga and it is really quaint. All the cruise ship passengers come here in the summer, and so do many ordinary locals too. The café called Husaren was the first to sell really oversized cinnamon buns which lately have become something of a symbol for all the cafés in Haga.

Of the houses built in the late 1880s, the big stone building and the crinkly landshövdingehus along Haga Nygata and Sprängkullsgatan have been preserved. But the ”back” of the block was completely replaced in the 1980s.

Episode 231: kv Bajonetten

District: Haga

Photo date: 12 March 2022

Sprängkullsgatan once again lives up to its name, what with the blasting works going on for Västlänken right underneath Hagakyrkan. No wait, the work there was halted two years ago and it is just a barricaded area with a busy motorway running through it now. But we had fun trying to determine just how much Spräng had been made in the Kulle, and how much rock was left above the proposed railway tunnel. No drawings or surveys from the time still exist. (Hint: the result was ”almost no rock”.)

Among the elaborate landshövdingehus in this block stands one really ancient house with only two storeys and a somewhat fancier stone house for the Haga parish. The back of the block was completely replaced in the 1980s. The Eckerstein bookshop was one of the best in Gothenburg, which sold academic literature and non-mainstream works. Towards the end of its existence it resided in what is now the Chinese consulate.

Episode 232: kv Laddstaken

District: Haga

Photo date: 12 April 2022

Here is a block that reeks of history – if any block in Haga should be preserved it is this one. Luckily, only three quarters of the houses were demolished and replaced in the late 1980s.

Fredberg has much to write about the Hussars that gave Haga much of its air of… I hesitate to say horse manure. Flair, flamboyance, dash, rambunctiousness? When they were decommissioned in 1875, their barracks became a police station for the mounted police. In 1914 it too was moved, to a fancy new house in Masthugget.

He also has a few things to say about Concert du Boulevard and how weird the Salvation Army was to ordinary Swedes when they took over the premises in the mid-1880s. I find it quite hilarious that socialism didn’t take off in Gothenburg at that time, since our city became a Red Fortress in the 1960s and 70s and still has a hard time shaking off that image all these liberal decades later.

Kvarteren Krikonet, Plommonet, Aprikosen, Bananen, Konstepidemin, Kastanjen, Hasselnöten

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Episodes 220 to 223 explore the remains of old Annedal – working class district and hospital area from the late 1800s.

Episode 220: kv Krikonet, kv Plommonet, kv Aprikosen, kv Bananen

District: Annedal

Photo date: 15 January 2022

District Annedal is one of those working class landshövdingehus areas that has acquired the sheen of a legendary golden age, when everything was good and true. And yes, looking at old photographs from before the transformation, it did look quite picturesque. Even some of the city officials thought so, and fought the other officials who won and razed almost the whole area in the early 1970s. But here just below the Landala Hill, a homogenous charity estate from the mid-1870s was spared. The northern part is more villa-like and was designed by Victor Adler. The southern part belongs to the Robert Dickson Foundation and was designed and built by P J Rapp.

Episode 221: Konstepidemin

District: Annedal

Photo date: 22 January 2022

Before embarking on this project, I had never been to the Art Epidemic. A couple of visits later I realise I have missed out on esthetic experiences! Not least architecturally, with buildings from the mid 1880s to the early 1920s. You can also pet a cat or converse with artists.

Episode 222: kv Kastanjen

District: Annedal

Photo date: 22 January 2022

When I studied computational linguistics around 1990, our lecture halls were spread out over the city. Our main base of operations was Humanisten but we daily trudged over the hill to Chalmers to learn programming. For one course we went to the psychology department in the old Lyckholm brewery south of Liseberg. Soon after, they moved to this typically-early-1990s building. The BASF building has been completed and the conscription office is kept busy now that Sweden finally has joined Nato. It will take a long time before the Västlänken railway tunnel is finished though…

Episode 223: kv Hasselnöten

District: Annedal

Photo date: 22 January 2022

Some older public buildings line the street too. My mother went to the seminary when she was young, and always referred to it as a happy time. The current main building was designed by one G Hermansson in a Jugend-y style. Above it sits the Media House, designed by the Krook & Tjäder bureau in 2006.

The maternity hospital next to it has also been taken over by Campus Linné. It was designed by Axel Kumlien in 1900, with a 1906 extension by Otto Dymling and a students’ lodgings from 1921.

Kvarteren Järneken, Falken, Morkullan, Anden, Sångsvanen, Sothönan, Fiskmåsen, Brushanen, Hägern, Spoven, Berget

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Episodes 216 to 219 contemplate the pros and cons of tearing down a whole district of un-modern wooden houses with a strong sense of community, to build modern machines for living where the community spirit has been lost.

Episode 216: kv Järneken, kv Falken, kv Morkullan, kv Anden

District: Landala

Photo date: 22 August 2021

Landala was once a vibrant working class district, with much crime and poverty but a strong sense of community. At least, that is what the inhabitants said in surveys after they had been uprooted in the 1970s ”sanitation” efforts, and sat in their single, lonely flats with all the mod cons. Sure the old landshövdingehus and rustic cottages were picturesque, but cold and draughty with outhouses in the courtyards and only cold water if any. Current inhabitants in the machines for living say they are pleased enough to live there.

The razed area was distributed among seven private entrepreneurs as well as the city’s housing company. The new Landala Torg and the too-brutalist block south of if were designed by Lars Ågren, Ingemar Mattsson and the K-Konsult bureau.

The little chapel that looks forlorn between the Brutalist architecture and the merciless traffic on Aschebergsgatan was built in 1885 from designs by Carl Möller.

Episode 217: kv Sångsvanen

District: Landala

Photo date: 22 August 2021

At the south end of Landala are a couple of blocks that weren’t fully sanitized in the 1970s. The landshövdingehus were some of the last to be built here, in 1915, from designs by O M Holmén and Hjalmar Cornilsen among others. The geology department of the university was located in Sångsvanen until the 1990s: a sign in one of the windows declared this. At that time, I was studying computational linguistics at the Holterman Hospital, then home to the computer science department of Chalmers. The old syphilis hospital has since been further remodelled to become a hostel for Chalmers students.

Episode 218: kv Sothönan

District: Landala

Photo date: 22 August 2021

These eleven disc houses were designed by Sven Brolid – the Brutalism can sometimes be stifling. But the Robert Dickson Foundation always adds some kind of decoration to their facades. The ones in The Coot are quite fun. I work in the same house as the Foundation, maybe I should climb the stairs one day and ask them about their artists?

Episode 219: kv Fiskmåsen, kv Brushanen, kv Hägern, kv Spoven, kv Berget, the water tower castle

District: Landala

Photo date: 22 August 2021

The Brutalist architecture continues up the Landala Hill. These houses were designed by Jaak Lohk who, before joining a private entrepreneur, was one of the architects who developed the new zoning plan for the city in the late 1960s.

The northwest side of Landala is slightly less sanitized than the rest of the district. Here are a few remaining landshövdingehus, a preschool from 2010, and three buildings from earlier expansions of the city’s critical infrastructure. The first water reservoir was constructed in 1871, the little fairy castle (and underground reservoir) came in 1892, a time when Peterson was very busy building water stations and schools, and finally the Jugend pumping station in 1905.

It is now April of 2024 and I can not remember why I didn’t go out to do any photography between September 2021 and January 2022, when the story picks up in district Annedal. How short and fickle the memory is!

Kvarteren i Övre Johanneberg och Chalmers

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Episodes 209 to 212 explore two separate bodies of architecture: one seminal Modernist group of buildings on a hill, and one agglomeration of academia in a valley.

Episode 209: Övre Johanneberg

District: Johanneberg

Photo date: 18 August 2021

In this Modernist dreamscape, every house is its own block: Hämplingen, Snöskatan, Strömstaren, Staren, Stjärtmesen, Lövsångaren, Berglärkan, Blåhaken, Sädesärlan, Steglitsan, Tornsvalan, Rödhaken, Flugsnapparen, Rörsångaren, Klippduvan, Ringtrasten, Alsiskan, Pilfinken and Snösparven.

If Albert Lilienberg was the frontman for 1920s Classicism in Gothenburg, his counterpart for Modernism was Uno Åhrén. As soon as he became planning director in 1927 he ushered in the new era, which really took off in the mid-1930s. Upper Johanneberg is one of the finest examples of early Modernism in Gothenburg. A quick search doesn’t say much about the architects themselves but Erik Friberger designed the lower houses west of Gibraltargatan, says the conservation paper on page 141.

Episode 210: kv Talltitan – Chalmers part 1

District: Johanneberg

Photo date: 28 August 2021

If Poseidon and Gustav II Adolf are the physical icons of Gothenburg, Chalmers is their spiritual counterpart. It is a sprawling agglomeration of buildings that in the latest decades also has colonised the northern shore of Göta Älv. Chalmerists, i.e. the students, uphold the mercantile, engineering and clubs&orders ideals of the city’s past.

Until 1962, Chalmers ran its own architectural bureau, naturally headed by the current professor of architecture. Just after the war, this was Melchior Wernstedt who between 1949 and 1960 designed the Gustaf Dahlén Hall, the power central, the students’ union house, the high energy bunker and the library. He also oversaw the construction of the ship’s trial building in 1940. He was succeeded by Helge Zimdal who in 1968 designed the architecture and civil engineering blocks down in the valley. Jan Wallinder was professor of ”formlära” at the time and he designed the administration building and the Palmstedt hall by the campus entrance in 1961.

There was another growth spurt in the 1990s and again in recent years. The students’ union house received an extension designed by Gert Wingårdh in 2000 and the Johanneberg Science Park was built in the last five years. The northern red house acts as a link to the Zimdal buildings, much like the Park itself is a link between academia and industry. It was designed by the Tengbom bureau who also designed the parking garage next to it. The White bureau didn’t want to be upstaged so they designed the rounded southern buildings.

Episode 211: kv Talltitan – Chalmers part 2

District: Johanneberg

Photo date: 28 August 2021

When Chalmers was still a private vocational school, it held an architectural competition for their new property in Gibraltar. The winners in 1921 were Arvid Fuhre, Hugo Jahnke, Conny Nyquist and Karl Samuelsson. They designed the first big physics building Origo and the smaller temple-like chemistry building next to it, in finest red-brick 1920s Classicism. Along the now-hidden main facade of the Origo building they placed medallions of famous Swedish scientists: Svante Arrhenius, Anders Ångström, Johan Carl Wilcke, Anders Celsius, Torbern Bergman, Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Jöns Jacob Berzelius and Alfred Nobel.

The physics and chemistry departments soon needed a lot more space and Klas Anshelm designed the big brick buildings in 1960, since added to even further. The lecture halls and big red-brick buildings along Gibraltargatan were built in the late 1960s, early 1970s too.

The HSB Living Lab at the south end of the lab buildings is a temporary structure – what it says on the tin, a lab for living in a house. The plans are dated 2016 and the architect is Tengbom. So I guess they will soon pick up their lab and move it somewhere else. The Gibraltar Guest House is also a temporary structure, according the the current zoning plan. The lodgings along the ship’s trial were built in the early 2000s.

As a aside, I can add that my master’s thesis dealt with the gabbro underlying much of Chalmers. It was a lot of fun, mapping outcrops and taking samples, panning for zircons and going to Stockholm to zap them with the ion probe in the basement of the National Natural History Museum. Then I wrestled with Word for a semester and finally boiled down the results in my one academic paper printed in GFF. Where you need a membership to search for it.


Episode 212: kv Talltitan – Vasa Sjukhus

District: Johanneberg

Photo date: 29 July 2021

The Chalmers campus has spread northwards too, down the hill towards the old asylum. In 1925, the only house here was the fantastically designed electrical substation by Conny Nyquist (page 140). Then came further physics and chemistry buildings in the 1970s, a microtech centre built by Skanska in the late 1990s and the student lodgings Chabo that was designed by the Wingårdh bureau and put up in 2005.

The Gibraltar Asylum, later hospital, was long feared and shunned as a final destination for the infirm and destitute. It was, however, a considerable improvement over the first asylums at Smedjegatan and Drottningtorget. The mentally ill were transferred to new premises in the 1930s and the hospital was in operation until 2000 when it was taken over by Chalmers and later various businesses.

Kvarteren Torpa, Aranäs, Axevall, Karlsten, Tidö, Vasakyrkan

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Episodes 186 to 190 visit some public and residential buildings from the early 1900s and a couple of Modernist blocks near Götaplatsen.

Episode 186: kv Torpa

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 27 June 2021

The ”front” of Torpa is dominated by a cinema built in 1936, with a facade in yellow brick that was popular at the time. Göta was one of several cinemas along Avenyn, all of them closed and converted to clothes stores or eateries – except this one which was converted back to a cinema recently, and Roy in Aranäs. In Sweden, only one chain of cinemas remains, Filmstaden formerly known as SF, and they decided they wanted an art house too, just like Roy. Thus the miraculous resurrection, coupled with an eatery.

The ”back” of Torpa is 20 years older and built in National Romanticist red brick. The architect was Hjalmar Zetterström and Gustaf Larsson built it.

Episode 187: kv Aranäs

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 27 June 2021

Royal was a cinema that was closed, and then resurrected under the name Roy (to make use of the neon sign without infringing on the copyright of the former name; clever). It used to be a normal cinema but after the resurrection it became an art house, with narrower productions, live transmissions from the Met and other places, and a cinema space that could be rented. The Star Trek association used it for several years, to show episodes on a big screen and hang out with likeminded people. But then the cinema wanted to use all available time for their own screenings and we found other premises. Not entirely easy though, all meeting venues have become prohibitively expensive.

The Royal block was built between 1932 and 1939 and the architects were Erik Holmdal, D Pehrson and Nils Olsson. It is completely Modernist with minimal decorations. The yellow bricks are typical of the time and can be seen in full glory in the south end of Olivedal.

Episode 188: kv Axevall

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 27 June 2021

Axevall was built along with Torpa in the mid nineteen noughties, and designed by Zetterström, K S Hansson and Anders Persson. My father’s aunt lived in a large flat here for a while and we visited in circa 1990. It was big and National Romanticist inside too.

Episode 189: kv Karlsten, kv Tidö

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 27 June and 17 July 2021

The Regional Archives are a lot of fun to visit. For my work, I have sometimes searched for drawings and other information about tunnels etc, which you can look at at the annex on Hisingen. The original house here at Karlsten is far too small to house all the material in Gothenburg, but I once visited with my father when he was much into genealogy in the 1980s. At that time, you had to search by hand and eye, in actual physical ledgers or on spools of microfilm that could be lent to your local library. Nowadays I understand everything is digitised and interpreted by AI. No challenges anymore! The extension from 2010 was designed by the White bureau and among other things it houses a temporary exhibition area.

The Students’ Union house can be rented for events like weddings or science fiction conventions – if you are a student or academic, and if you can afford it.

Episode 190: kv Vasakyrkan

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 17 July 2021

Until the late 1800s, early 1900s, the area around this church held several farms. Then new plans were laid out and several big public buildings were erected. A few forlorn outbuildings can be seen on old photos from the time but they too are long gone. One of the big buildings was this church, which is quite stupendous both inside and out. But I can’t find any information about the parish house. Can you?

Kvarteren Gälakvist, Skaraborg, Läckö, Koberg, Gräfsnäs, Årnäs

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Episodes 181 to 185 ramble around the Lorensberg villa-town and get all arty down by Poseidon, where Lexxians once gathered…

Episode 181: kv Gälakvist

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 20 June and 25 September 2021

When my mother studied art history in the 1980s, the department was located in one of these houses, probably Bjerke’s studio, my memory is hazy. I do remember the premises felt a bit cramped, though.

Episode 182: kv Skaraborg

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 20 June 2021

Albert Lilienberg planned the Lorensberg villa-town around a tiny square, Högåsplatsen, and made full use of the terrain contours for laying out the streets and plots. Earlier planning ideals would have laid out as square a grid as possible and instead made full use of dynamite to level the terrain – as is the custom today as well.

Högåsplatsen has a very light and airy feeling to it, also slightly English. Around it are all these lovely century-old houses: the villa where Ågren lived for 40 years before bequeathing it to the university; the only remaining wooden villa, typical of the time; the Mellgren villa that was taken over by medicos; and the rather stupendous Broström house with its nautical associations.

Episode 183: kv Läckö

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 20 June 2021

The houses in Läckö are a few years older than Gälakvist and Skaraborg, and the shift in styles is very noticeable. National Romanticism gives way to 1920s classicism and Modernism is just beginning to be felt. We add a couple of names to our list of architects: Karl Severin Hansson and Karl Samuelsson.

Two recent houses have been added too, where the architects’ usual crede that new houses should only and totally reflect the dominant contemporary style has been vetoed, either by the city architect (unlikely, that office is utterly insipid) or by the powerful interests operating on this hill (more likely, Gothenburg isn’t nicknamed Graftenburg for nothing). The two new houses are at Bengt Lidnersgatan 7 and Ekmansgatan 5. The latter was designed by Albert Svensson in what must be called a Neo-Neo-Classical style, and can be seen in Intermission IIIb.

One of the big names on the hill was Ekman, a once very influential family of traders and magnates on a par with Dickson and Wijk. Their flame has somewhat gone out these days, though. But the house that bears their name here is quite spectacular, ushering in the 1920s style that would soon be seen in all the landshövdingehus districts springing up around the outskirts of town.

Episode 184: kv Koberg

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 20 June 2021

In Koberg we add another young architect, Ebbe Crone. The houses in this block are variously offices and housing associations. Most houses in the villa-town were residential when built and then turned into offices in the 1950s. Recently, quite a few of the offices have been converted back to residential use. But not the Builders’ Association, which is still very active in its offices in Villa Hertz.

Episode 185: kv Gräfsnäs, kv Årnäs

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 6 June 2021

Finally, here we are at one of the major landmarks in Gothenburg, the Art Museum. The top of Kungsportsavenyen had long been left undeveloped because the city planners recognized that it had to be rather spectacular and not a whim or half-measure that would make everyone angry over the years. So it wasn’t until the 300th anniversary exhibition that ideas and plans finally gelled: they simply had to produce something for that event! And thus was borne the Gothenburg Art Museum, which together with the Art Hall next to it are the only structures in the area left of the exhibition. (My grandmother tells in her memoirs how she used to walk across the building site to get to school, and one day dropped a bottle of tadpoles in the excavated rubble…)

The museum contains the original Fürstenberg collection from the late 1800s, which is very typical of the time with animals and naked young women, several Dutch masters including a scary painting of the severed head of St John the Baptist, and modern sections including temporary exhibition areas in the extension designed by Rune Falk and the White Bureau. Both the Art Museum and the Art Hall were designed by Ericson and Bjerke, who together with Swensson and Torulf were responsible for the overall design of the anniversary exhibition.

Surrounding Götaplatsen were temporary strucures that were dismantled after the exhibition. It took a decade or more before the area was completed, with the iconic (yes, I use that worn word very consciously) statue of Poseidon, the City Theatre and the Concert Hall. Classicism and finest Modernism surround the open space, where political manifestations happen, music gigs take place and sports stars are given heroes’ welcomes. And Lexxians gather to sing the Brunnen-G song, at least we did a quarter of a century ago…

Kvarteren Ulriksdal, Hörningsholm, Tullgarn, Drottningholm, Sparreholm, Gripsholm, Nääs, Visingsborg

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Episodes 176 to 180 enter the area of the 1923 Anniversary Exhibition and Lilienberg-land.

Episode 176: kv Ulriksdal

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 13 June 2021

No architectural historian has devoted time and grants to this area yet so there is not much to add to the narration. The architects for this block and Drottningholm are given as Ernst Torulf, Hjalmar Zetterström, Tor Zetterström, Karl M Bengtsson, Arvid Bjerke, Ragnar Ossian Swensson, Nils Olsson and Erik Holmdal.

Episode 177: kv Hörningsholm, kv Tullgarn

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 6 June 2021

In the 1980s my mother studied art history at university and she wrote a paper on the City Theatre. I can’t remember much of it because at that time I was not at all interested in architecture or local history – so boring! Then suddenly, overnight almost, I became fascinated by both subjects. Maybe it’s an age thing.

Soon after this episode was completed, the old girls’ school and adjoining car park were razed and something else will be put up there. The zoning document suggests more performing arts space, and an entrance to the new train station at Korsvägen. Something for a later Intermission…

Episode 178: kv Drottningholm

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 13 June 2021

This block was only half-built when my grandmother passed it on her way to school, or to the family shop at Kungsportsplatsen. The south end of the block abutted the 1923 exhibition area.

Episode 179: kv Sparreholm, kv Gripsholm

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 20 and 22 June 2021

And now we enter the area where the city decided to hold its 300th anniversary exhibition, two years late in 1923. Johanneberg was built in the 1700s and had until recently been a working farm with big gardens and greenhouses but its time was up – and now the last vestiges of the grounds have been excavated away for a new train station. At least this part of Västlänken is still being built, unlike the middle station at Haga.

On the hill was the historical part of the exhibition, with wooden halls built for archeology, design, sports, crematoria (sic), crafts and victualling history, and lots of restaurants. In the middle was a big plaza topped by a strange memorial building. On this site now stands the 1984 part of the university building, and the university library stands on the former main restaurant. The original part of the library building was designed by Ärland Noreen in 1939 but it wasn’t built until 1951. The Coordinator bureau designed the 1982 extension. The yellow high-rise was designed by Jaan Allpere and Claes Melin. For the newest extension to the university building, designed by the KUB bureau, a new zoning plan was drawn up where you can read some of the text I wrote about the rock slopes in the area.

Episode 180: kv Nääs, kv Visingsborg

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 20 June 2021

With Nääs and Visingsborg we enter the Lorensberg villa area. Albert Lilienberg planned it in 1913 and it was realised by the up and coming set of architects that put their mark on Gothenburg in this and the next couple of decades. The houses were built for the poshest members of the bourgeoisie, and certainly not for plebes and commoners.

Axel Carlander was a very big man in Gothenburg at the time. He made lots of money but also worked tirelessly for the public good. Apart from this National Romanticist gem, he has left his name on a hospital overlooking the funfair Liseberg. The lodge in Nääs is still active and even has a well-designed web page.

Kvarteren Malmöhus, Oppensten, Borgeby, Örbyhus samt Lorensbergsparken

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Episodes 171 to 175 tour the tail-end of Neo-Renaissance and celebrate early and late Modernism.

Episode 171: kv Malmöhus

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 30 May 2021

Wallenstam recently changed its logo from the ant carrying a letter m or W, to a stylised ant drawn with a single looping line. Maybe the ant carrying a pine needle, as seen on Engelbrektsgatan 28, is the original logo from the 1950s?

Trying to find some information about the modern houses in the middle of the block (a real estate agent says they were built in 1943), I came across the current zoning plan for the area. It is dated 1867!

Episode 172: kv Oppensten

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 29 May 2021

Wilhelm Röhss was one of the magnates in the 19th century who donated parts of their estates to the city, to be used for the public good. Since the sums were substantial, the foundations are still operating today. The Röhss monies were used to build this museum to which my mother would drag me quite often (my favourite museum was the ethnographic one, with American Indians). When the museum was built, it was in the then-fashionable National Romanticist style. The two extensions were also designed in then-current fashions: Melchior Wernstedt’s 1930s early-Modernism and the late-Modernist one from circa 1960, by Sven Brolid and Jan Wallinder.

At the other end of the block is the Academy of Craft and Design, or some better equivalent to its many names: Slöjdförenings skola, Konstindustriskolan, Högskolan för design och konsthantverk. Hans Hedlund’s original building has been added to by Sigfrid Ericson in 1915 (the penthouse) and the White design bureau in 1992 (filling up the former courtyard). Today, it is part of the university and offers education in all the fine arts.

Episode 173: kv Borgeby

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 30 May 2021

Here is the original Valand that the current Academy of Fine Arts takes its name from. It was quite an important institution (at least locally), producing several fine artists over the years. The school moved to new premises in 1925 and has led a wandering existence since then. The Par Bricole lodge took over the house at that time and are still very much going strong.

The block is built on land that belonged to the old farm Kristinelund. Nothing remains of it but the street name, and apart from Valand nothing remains of the first stone houses either. At the south end of the block is a beautiful Modernist house designed by Nils Olsson in the late 1930s. The middle of the block was razed in the late 1950s and two new houses designed by Helge Zimdal were put up along Avenyn. Some ten years ago they were given a makeover, and the western side of the block was completely rebuilt from designs by Anna Sunnerö at the Wingårdh bureau. Gert Wingårdh is the current mega-star in Swedish architecture.

Episode 174: kv Örbyhus

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 29 May 2021

In this block, too, the back side along Teatergatan has been redeveloped from designs by Jacek Zalecki at Wingårdhs. Apparently, the previous 1930s and 1960s houses were ”shoddy” and ”disgusting” – the very same words used for the districts that were lamentedly razed in the 1960s and 70s. Plus ça change…

Originally, the whole block was built in intricate Neo-Renaissance in the late 1890s, but only the end houses have been left standing. Of the three middle houses along Avenyn, the northern one was built in 1935 and designed by Nils Olsson in a calm and clean Modernist style. The other two houses were designed by Lund & Valentin in late-Modernist style and built in 1961. As in Borgeby, they were given a makeover by Wingårdhs some ten years ago.

Episode 175: Lorensbergsparken

District: Lorensberg

Photo date: 5 June 2021

When I was a kid, my parents used to go dancing at a place called Sophus, named after the last and famous restaurateur at the Lorensberg entertainment complex, much written about by Fredberg. Almost nothing remains of it today, other than the Lorensberg Theatre and the name of the whole district. And a small play area with circus horses…

The big hotel was designed by Nils Einar Eriksson in 1948, to house visiting industrialists. It still looks much like it did when it opened but the city library has been given a facelift designed by the Erséus bureau. The theatre was designed by Karl M Bengtsson but when it was turned into a cinema in 1934 it was redesigned by R O Swensson and H Widlund. In 1987 it was turned back into a theatre which it still is. For now.

Kvarteren Häggen, Hasseln, Högskolan, Örebrohus, Trollenäs

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Episodes 166 to 170 stroll around the Vasa Park.

Episode 166: kv Häggen

District: Vasastaden

Photo date: 16 May 2021

Who designed Edvard Svensson’s imposing corner house at Aschebergsgatan 1? There is a discussion on page 189 in ”Vasastaden-Lorensberg”. Sedenmalm is rather dismissive of the ”small builders” who had worked their way up constructing landshövdingehus. The styles are variously Neo-Renaissance, as was popular at the time. The Old Gothenburg site also collates the entries about this block in that paper – quite handy. And CRA Fredberg offers lively vignettes about life and times in the general area.

Episode 167: kv Hasseln

District: Vasastaden

Photo date: 22 May 2021

When the old farm Brantdala, Steep Dale, had to give way to modern development in 1910, the area was planned by Albert Lilienberg. He put his mark on large parts of the then-city and although he was rather reviled by the following modernists, he has in later years become something of a celebrity, it seems. Books and articles mention him often.

As the area is very hilly, it had been too difficult to build on it until now, when dynamite made everything so much easier. The Domesticity house Föreningsgatan 32 was built in 1911, in a sort of Jugend / National Romanticism mix. Björner Hedlund designed it together with his father Hans. The northwest corner of the block was built a few years later and by that time fashions had shifted radically towards 1920s Classicism.

Episode 168: kv Högskolan and Vasaparken

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 27 February 2021

The old university building is listed but still in use, for representation and administrative offices. I’ve attended a couple of public lectures there, one by an adventurer who described his expedition to the Nazca geoglyphs. It was like being transported back in time a hundred years, when explorers toured the lecture circuits to finance their new expeditions! Amundsen, Hedin, Shackleton spring to mind.

The Vasa Park and its convoluted gestation is described in all my sources, a popular subject. Photos of small boys on sleds tobogganing down the steep terrain are obligatory.

Episode 169: kv Örebrohus

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 29 May 2021

The blocks around what became the Vasa Park were built around 1890 to 1900. The posh new inhabitants must have disliked the shanty town between them intensely. Likewise the other shanty town to the north, Flygarns Haga. Luckily, the authorities soon had them ”moved along” and the first wave of gentrification in Gothenburg was completed.

Örebrohus is Neo-Renaissance and Neo-Gothic rohbau, but the younger houses are starting to look at the interesting new style called Jugend.

Episode 170: kv Trollenäs

District: Vasastaden (formerly Lorensberg)

Photo date: 29 May 2021

Here is another block built and designed by firms that had started out making landshövdingehus. By now they had made enough money to spend on lavish decorations for their Neo-Renaissance and Neo-Gothic facades, as described on page 284 in ”Vasastaden-Lorensberg”.

Instead of brick and plaster, they could spend on limestone, granite and sandstone. Two members of SGU, the Swedish Geological Survey, recently wrote an excursion guide to the geology of Gothenburg cladding.