Hakon Ahlberg

Who was Hakon Ahlberg?

Hakon Ahlberg was a Swedish architect, editor and author, best known as the official architect for the repair and restoration of Gripsholm Castle near the town of Mariefred in central Sweden. He was one of the founding members and first president of SAR, the Swedish Architects’ Association, and was well known as an active participant in architectural debate in Sweden, and was editor-in-chief of the Swedish architectural journals Arkitekten in 1922 and Byggmästaren 1922-24. He was also president of the Swedish Academy of Fine Arts 1954-62.

Ahlberg studied architecture at the Royal Institute of Technology, completing his studies in 1914. He also undertook studies at the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts in 1914-1917, one of his most influential teachers being Ivar Tengbom.

Ahlberg's principal role in Swedish architecture was not as a “leader of style” but as an idealistic leader, as an organiser and spokesman of the Swedish architectural profession.

As an architect he was part of the brief movement called Nordic Classicism, but with clear links with Swedish vernacular architecture, as expressed in the simple wooden houses he designed for the Swedish Trade Union Confederation’s People’s Academy in Brunnsvik in 1928. He designed a number of churches, museums, and hospitals as well as housing. His most important works are the Arts and Crafts pavilion at the Gothenburg exhibition in 1923, and the PUB department store in central Stockholm from 1924. Ahlberg designed a number of hospitals, including the Sidsjön mental hospital in Sundsvall 1939-44, the Children's clinic in Oslo, Norway, and the University Hospital in Maracaibo in Venezuela.