Kiruna is located in the very north of Sweden, 145 km above the Arctic Circle. Founded next to an ore deposit, this city is the largest iron producer in the country, and it is the mining industry, coupled with a very harsh climate, that defines its face. By holding an international competition for the design of the local administration building, the authorities sought to obtain a bright and iconic volume that would highlight the exceptional role of Kiruna in the Swedish economy and give local residents a new attraction. In the first round of the open competition, 56 bureaus took part, in the second, five teams were selected, and the best international jury recognized the project Henning Larsen Architects.
The project of the Danish bureau was named "Crystal". The architects interpreted the new building of the city council as a composition of two volumes. One of them is reserved for social and cultural functions and consists of several folded parallelepipeds that are shifted relative to each other. As conceived by the architects, this part of the complex is intended to symbolize the ore mined here - therefore, this building is supposed to be faced with metal panels of a golden-bronze hue. The "deposit" is inscribed in a round-shaped building of the administration itself - surrounded by ribbons of windows, it, in turn, embodies the openness of power structures and the democratic nature of the very process of making important decisions for the city.
The inner building of the complex, which will include exhibition halls, meeting rooms and spaces for various master classes, as well as the main meeting room of the city council, will be fully open to the public. In the atrium, which appears between the two buildings, a large number of comfortable spaces will be created for the townspeople, where you can relax, socialize, shelter from the bad weather and just spend time. By the way, speaking of bad weather: the outer ring of offices serves as a guarantee that the microclimate in this part of the building will always be comfortable.
The construction of the city council, which is promised to be completed by 2016, will be the first implementation in the framework of the project to create a new administrative and business district of Kiruna. The fact is that the city is forced to move its center to a new location: the field passes so close to the existing one that its development inevitably affects the condition of buildings. However, this does not mean that the current Kiruna Town Hall, built in 1958, will simply be demolished. The building, which today is deservedly considered the symbol of Sweden's northernmost city, will also partially move to the new district: for example, its clock tower will decorate the square that Henning Larsen Architects are demolishing in front of the new administration of Kiruna.
