The Wenner-Gren Center and the possibility of steel building in postwar Sweden

The Wenner-Gren Center’s primary mission is to promote international cooperation in scientific research, but already in its construction phase, it has been of great significance for the Swedish building industry by re-introducing steel as a competitive framing material, prompting new technical solutions that have now become available to others in Swedish construction.

Byggnadsvärlden no. 45, 1961

Photograph from the dinner party at the prime minister’s residence Harpsund following Axel Wenner-Gren’s and Marguerite Wenner-Gren’s donation. Prime minister Tage Erlander had promised to oversee and provide a piece of property for a center dedicated to scientific research. From the left: Axel Wenner-Gren, professor Hugo Theorell (Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine in 1955), marshal of the realm Birger Ekeberg, prime minister Tage Erlander. Earlier in the fall of 1955, Wenner-Gren’s delegates – professor Ragnar Nilsson, professor Manne Siegbahn and professor Hugo Theorell, who had been chosen to develop guidelines for the foundation – had met with the prime minister and the minister of finance Per Edvin Sköld, the minister of education Ragnar Edenstam, and the minister of transport in order to reach an agreement. Reprint from the front page of Svenska Dagbladet, November 1, 1955.

On November 1, 1955, Swedish public radio and the front pages of all the local newspapers announced that the industrialist and founder of Electrolux, Axel Wenner-Gren, and his celebrity wife, the former opera singer Marguerite Wenner-Gren, had donated ten million Swedish kronor for the establishment of a scientific foundation. The previous day, the couple had hosted a press conference at their grand villa in Diplomatstaden, in Stockholm’s embassy district. There, Axel Wenner-Gren had announced to the media that the couple’s aim was to establish a major international research center owned and administrated by the Wenner-Gren Foundation. Wenner-Gren, then 72 years old, presented this contribution as one of his last major philanthropic initiatives, stating that he firmly believed that scientific research could advance greatly if the material resources were available, and asserting that “research is an elementary and vital factor for cultural progress and for society’s healthy development.” In order to support what he believed to be “a surprising number of outstanding scientists in our little country,” he intended to establish the center and house it in an 18-story tall building. This tower would be a venue for conferences and symposia; it would contain a library, an auditorium, lecture halls, and apartments for about a hundred researchers, as well as offices for the Wenner-Gren Foundation and other research administrations. This was the very beginning of a vision of a center that would attract scientists from both Sweden and abroad. It was a response which reflected a contemporary international concern with supporting the development of the technical and scientific fields in the wake of the Second World War.

These aspects vary constantly, so each wave is different from another wave, even if not immediately adjacent or successive; in other words, there are some forms and sequences that are repeated, though irregularly distributed in space and time.

Since what Mr. Palomar means to do at this moment is simply see a wave — that is, to perceive all its simultaneous components without overlooking any of them — his gaze will dwell on the movement of the wave that strikes the shore until it can record aspects not previously perceived; as soon as he notices that the images are being repeated, he will know he has seen everything he wanted to see and he will be able to stop.

The Construction of Construction