St Peter’s Church

Lewerentz’s last church is even darker and more concentrated than St Mark’s. Everything is brick, and no brick is cut. In the middle of the room stands a single steel column carrying the roof, and the windows are fixed to the outside of the wall without frames.

The parish of Klippan wanted a new church, and Sigurd Lewerentz, then in his seventies, was given the commission after St Mark’s. The church was built in 1962–1966. Lewerentz followed the work on site and developed the solutions together with the bricklayers. He wanted the church to be built of a single material, brick, without any brick being cut.

The church interior is almost square and very dark. In the middle stands a cruciform steel column carrying two beams and the roof with its low brick vaults. The windows are sheets of glass screwed to the outside of the wall, without frames, so that the opening in the brickwork is clean. The font is a large seashell standing over a crack in the floor, into which water drips. Floor, walls, ceiling and furnishings are all in the same dark brick. Lewerentz also designed the lighting and the details.

St Peter’s Church has become one of the 20th century’s most admired churches among architects all over the world. It shows how Lewerentz departed from most conventions and created an architecture of material, light and darkness. The church is still used as a parish church and attracts visitors from many countries.

• Post-war modernism
• Sigurd Lewerentz