National Romanticism and Art Nouveau
Around the turn of the century architects sought a Swedish form in brick, granite and timber, with medieval churches and the Vasa castles as models.
Ragnar Östberg’s Stockholm City Hall, opened in 1923, and Carl Westman’s courthouse on Kungsholmen, completed in 1915, are the chief works of National Romanticism in the capital. Lars Israel Wahlman’s Engelbrekt Church rises on a rocky outcrop above Lärkstaden.
At the same time Art Nouveau was built with flowing forms, such as the Royal Dramatic Theatre of 1908 by Fredrik Lilljekvist, and Ferdinand Boberg designed the Thiel Gallery for the banker Ernest Thiel.
The Riksdag building on Helgeandsholmen, by Aron Johansson, and the Nordic Museum, by Isak Gustaf Clason, show that historicism lived on.