Center and Periphery

The book collects five holiday homes in Sweden designed by Stockholm-based architect Mikael Bergquist. Realised over more than two decades, they are all located in the Swedish countryside and root in the Nordic tradition of timber construction and the simplicity and economy of historic Swedish farm buildings. Bergquists great care for detail and choice of materials characterise these houses. They are united also by a close relationship to the surrounding nature, the experience of which is enhanced by the concepts of movement and the placement of passages between outside and inside. The houses are documented with newly taken photographs as well as with plans and sections. In his supplementing essay, Bergquist writes about the special position of working as an architect on the periphery of Europe. He draws a picture of Swedish architecture that is marked by what he calls fruitful misunderstandings of current movements, and in which poverty of the rural population has been a major factor in the evolution of design and construction of dwellings.