The present day
After the Million Programme the block and the street returned. Today Swedish architecture is about new districts on old harbours, about timber and climate – and about converting rather than demolishing.
Ricardo Bofill’s arch at Södra station, completed in 1992, is a postmodern housing block in classical form. Rafael Moneo designed the new building of Moderna Museet on Skeppsholmen, and Santiago Calatrava’s Turning Torso in Malmö was the tallest building in Sweden when it was completed in 2005.
Old buildings are given new life: the Nationalmuseum was renovated and reopened in 2018, Moderna Museet Malmö opened in 2009 in an old power station, and in the industrial landscape of Norrköping the textile mills have become a university, museums and homes.
Sara Cultural Centre in Skellefteå, opened in 2021 and designed by White arkitekter, shows how far timber construction has come.