Environment and exposure.

Abstract

When in 1932, Charles-Édouard Jeanneret-Gris submitted his contribution to the architectural competition that would precede one of the most ambitious and extensive urban redevelopment projects in European history, Norrmalmsregleringen, it was Stockholms inner city, mainly Gamla Stan, which constituted, for him, the epitome of poorly utilized urban land, a "frightening chaos and saddening monotony" (in: Ville Radieuse, 1935). His concept would have replaced all (!) of Norrmalm and Södermalm with giant slatted houses, traffic flowing over a giant highway bridge. Rare exceptions would have been made for the royal palace and perhaps one or two significant churches, while the rest of the inner city was to be "cleaned and purged" in favour of "a calm and powerful architecture" of steel, plate glass, and reinforced concrete (1) (2).