Sustainable architecture exhibited at the Swedish Institute in Paris
Time: February 13–April 19, 2009 (preview February 12, 2009 6-8:30 pm)
Place: Institut suédois, Paris
In many surveys across the world, Sweden has been ranked as one of the most environmentally conscious countries. This is particularly true for architecture and housing construction, which in Sweden often bring together environmental thinking and functional design. So between February 13 and April 19 (with the opening February 12), the exhibit Archi DURABLE – d’un modèle à une vision (roughly “Sustainable architecture – from model to vision”) is being shown at the Swedish Institute in Paris.
Photo: Kungsbrohuset. © Strategisk Arkitektur. The image may not be used for any other purpose except to report on the exhibit.
“Archi DURABLE takes as its starting point how architecture in Sweden has also come to take into account the environment and future generations,” says Mikael Jönsson, head of the Swedish Institute in Paris. Beginning with Sweden’s 20th century notion of “folkhem,” the welfare state, the exhibit illustrates how Swedish equality and justice have also come to be associated with sustainable town planning.
The exhibit consists of three parts. Greener Than Thou? displays eleven Swedish architectural projects that bring together ecology, esthetics and structural engineering, from the Ice Hotel in Jukkasjärvi to Villa J in Stockholm. The Swedish Museum of Architecture provides more of a retrospect – with a selection from its traveling exhibit Att bygga ett land ("Building a country") showing photos, blueprints and other items pertaining to Swedish domestic architecture. Also being shown is Les Suédoises du Calvados, photos by Jean-Marc Piel, which presents the four hundred functional-style homes that Sweden donated to the bombed-out city of Caen after World War II thanks to the persuasion of the Swedish journalist Victor Vinde.
The films Hammarby Sjöstad, Kitchen Stories (about HFI, Sweden’s Research Institute for the Home, in the 1930s) and Vällingby (about the model Swedish suburb) will be screened alongside the exhibits.
Two seminars will be held:
March 19 on the theme Sustainable building at the Swedish Embassy in partnership with the Swedish Trade Council,
March 20 on the theme Sustainable living at the Swedish Institute in Paris (sign-up: Marion Alluchon, e-mail: 
).
Lectures and debates
On March 24 at 7:30 pm, the historian Marc Pottier will hold a lecture together with Victor Vinde’s son Pierre Vinde on the “Swedish houses” of Caen, Normandy.
On April 7 at 7:30 pm, a debate will be held on the role of art and culture in a sustainable society, including examples from Växjö, the collective project 100 Hus and the Swedish National Public Art Council’s decoration of public spaces.
A follow-up with Carl Larsson
Archi DURABLE will also get a sequel in the upcoming program at the Swedish Institute in Paris in the form of an exhibit on contemporary design, based on the interior design ideals of Karin and Carl Larsson. The exhibit, which is planned for May 6 (with a preview May 5, 6-8:30 pm), is a collaboration between the Swedish Institute in Paris, the Röhsska Museum of Design and Decorative Arts in Göteborg and the Carl Larsson-Gården in Sundborn.
Practical information:
Centre culturel suédois
11 rue Payenne, 75003 Paris (metro: Saint-Paul or Chemin Vert)
Information: www.ccs.si.se / tel: +33-(0)1 44 78 80 20
Opening hours: 12 noon to 6 pm Tuesday to Sunday
Free entrance