The Strängnäs Cathedral and its surroundings is a cohesive environment with many layers of cultural and historical value. At the cathedral hill, the powerful structure of the church meets the oscillating landscape, the sky and the light. Inside rests layers of human history, rooms that bear traces of time passed, but also faces forward toward times yet unseen. As an addition to the church, two structures are proposed, each functioning as a link between the church and the city, both placed at the foot of the cathedral hill.

The brick of the additions binds together the historical with the presence, and speaks to the materiality and the massivity of the cathedral. The public spaces of the additions are fully constructed out of brick. The stone and the mortar gives a possibility to work with detail and volume, create generous and understandable rooms that at the same time are heavy and sculptural, as a way to manifest a diginified unity where the colloquial is elevated.

The two additions on the cathedral hill are imprints of the present age, they take care of the cultural-historical values of the landscape and defines their own qualitites.

Open competition – shortlisted

Team: Emil Bäckström, Petra Gipp, Jonas Hesse, Karel Sucaet