Sverre Fehn and the City: Rethinking Architecture¿s Urban Premises

The urban attentions of Pritzker Laureate Sverre Fehn (1924¿2009) are extensive, but as yet virtually unexplored. This book examines ten select projects to illuminate Fehn¿s approach to the city, the embodiment of that thinking in his designs, and the broader lessons those efforts offer for better understanding the relationship between architecture and urban life, with unignorable implications for emergent urban architecture and its address of sociological and ecological crises. Wary of large-scale planning proposals or the erasure of existing urban patterns, Fehn offered an uncommon and profoundly vibrant approach to urbanism at the scale of the single architectural project. His writings, constructed buildings, competition entries, and lectures suggest opportunities for reinvigorating architecture¿s engagement with the city, and provoke a rethinking of concepts foundational to its theorization. What is the nature of urbanity? What is the relationship of urbanity to the natural worl