Sverre Fehn Biography, Buildings and Best Books

Sverre Fehn (1924-2009) was a Norwegian architect whose poetic, deeply material buildings brought modernism into dialogue with nature, history and the Nordic landscape. Best known for the Nordic Pavilion in Venice and the Hedmark Museum in Hamar, he received the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1997.

Oslo, Morocco and Paris

Born in Kongsberg, Fehn graduated from the Oslo School of Architecture in 1949 and was a member of PAGON, the Norwegian branch of CIAM. A journey to Morocco in 1952 introduced him to vernacular building, and in Paris he spent time in the studio of Jean Prouvé.

The Nordic Pavilion

His pavilion for Norway at the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair was followed by the Nordic Pavilion at the Venice Biennale (1962), where a grid of slender concrete beams filters the light and lets the trees grow through the roof, one of the most admired small buildings of the 20th century.

Hedmark Museum and Landscape

At the Hedmark Museum in Hamar (1967-1979), built over the ruins of a medieval bishop’s palace, Fehn threaded concrete ramps and timber roofs through the old walls, an exemplary dialogue between new architecture and history. Later works such as the Norwegian Glacier Museum in Fjærland, Villa Busk and the Aukrust Centre continued his search for an architecture rooted in landscape.

Teaching and Recognition

Fehn taught for decades at the Oslo School of Architecture, influencing generations of Norwegian architects. He received the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1997, and his last major work, a pavilion for the National Museum of Architecture in Oslo, opened in 2008, a year before his death.