Erik Gunnar Asplund

Erik Gunnar Asplund (1885-1940) was one of the great masters of Swedish architecture of the twentieth century, one of the leading exponents of Scandinavian classicism of the 1920s and one of the first Scandinavian adherents to the Modern Movement in the following decade, forerunner of a successful current that would influence future design legends such as Alvar Aalto and Arne Jacobsen. Also protagonist of an intense theoretical activity, in his youth he battled for a long time with the architectural trends in vogue at the time, all centered on drawing, instead advocating greater attention to the materiality of buildings. A line also confirmed in the most famous of his projects, the Stockholm City Library, whose central hall with an imposing cylindrical volume takes on the appearance of a real tower of books. His other important achievements were the Swedish pavilion at the Stockholm Expo in 1930 and the Wood Cemetery in Stockholm, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, created in collaboration with Sigurd Lewerentz. Some of the furniture he designed are now re-proposed by Cassina in the "I Maestri" collection and by the Swedish brand Källemo. His creations in the field of lighting instead appear in the catalogs of brands such as Blond Belysning and Ateljé Lyktan.