Despite the relatively small number of completed projects, Fen was considered the patriarch of the Norwegian architectural scene. His work was an example of all the best that is put into the concept of "Scandinavian design": attention to material, extensive use of light, a subtle sense of context.
Among the sources of the formal language of Fen's work are the buildings of the mature Le Corbusier, the architecture of North Africa, and, of course, the national tradition. That is why he was so successful in projects based on the merger of the building with the environment: architectural, like the ruins of a medieval cathedral for the Hedmark Museum in Hamar, or natural, like the landscapes of Fjerland for the Norwegian Glacier Museum. Sometimes the creation of man and nature are inextricably linked in the works of Sverre Fehn, as in his pavilion of the Scandinavian countries at the Venice Biennale, where trees grow right inside the exhibition hall.
Despite the boldness and originality of the architect's buildings, he never aspired to novelty or brightness as an end in itself, preferring to find a subtle harmony with the surrounding world, an architectural expression of Norwegian nature - dim northern light, gray stone and green coniferous forest.
