Stockholm Concert Hall
A blue cube fronted by ten tall, slender Corinthian columns. Tengbom simplified classicism into almost abstract forms and let colour, light and art do the rest. The building is one of the best known of Nordic Classicism and is the venue for the Nobel Prize award ceremony.
Stockholm long lacked a proper concert hall, and after a competition in 1920 Ivar Tengbom was commissioned to design one at Hötorget. Construction took place during the early 1920s, and the building was inaugurated in 1926. Tengbom belonged to the generation that turned away from the brick and heavy forms of National Romanticism towards a light and elegant classicism, often called Swedish Grace. He treated the classical elements freely, elongating the columns and simplifying the details, and let the pale blue rendered façade give the building its distinctive character. The hall was built for the Concert Society, which later became the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, and was to be both a concert venue and a festive meeting place for the city. Tengbom engaged several artists, and the building became a collaboration between architecture, painting and sculpture.
The façade facing Hötorget is dominated by ten tall, slender columns with Corinthian capitals, standing in front of a closed blue cube. Behind them lie the entrance hall and foyers, and at the heart of the building the main concert hall, where the orchestra plays and the Nobel Prizes are presented. The smaller hall, the Grünewald Hall, was painted by Isaac Grünewald with vividly coloured motifs and is named after him. The interiors are rich in applied art, with ornament, stucco work and lighting designed by Tengbom in the same simplified classicism as the façade. The steps in front of the building leading down to the square turn it into a stage in the city. On the steps, since 1936, stands Carl Milles’s Orpheus Fountain, in which the singer is surrounded by figures listening to his music.
Since its inauguration the Concert Hall has been the venue for the Nobel Prize award ceremony almost every year. The main hall has been remodelled several times to improve the acoustics and to meet new requirements, which has prompted debate about how much of the original should be preserved. The building is one of the best-known works of Nordic Classicism, a style that attracted international attention in the 1920s and is usually described as a refined, light and often playful interpretation of antiquity. Tengbom later designed, among other things, the Stockholm School of Economics and became one of the most sought-after architects of his time. The Orpheus Fountain and the columns make Hötorget one of Stockholm’s most clearly defined urban spaces.