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Bagsværd Church

Bagsværd Church

Jørn Utzon

Photo: Erik Christensen · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Location
Bagsværd, Denmark
Client / Owner
Bagsværd parish
Year
Completed 1976
Access
Public
Typology
Spiritual

Bagsværd Church is a Lutheran church on the northern edge of Copenhagen. Jørn Utzon designed it in 1968. The congregational council championed the project, and Gladsaxe municipality contributed one million kroner toward a total cost of ten million. Construction ran from 1973 to 1976, and it was consecrated on August 15, 1976.

The critic Kenneth Frampton describes it as an example of critical regionalism. Utzon drew on the idea of clouds over a shore, and on Chinese Buddhist temple design for the modular plan. From outside it resembles a factory more than a traditional church. It is made of white prefabricated concrete panels and glazed white tiles, among birch trees.

Inside is an all-white space with a vaulted ceiling of thin concrete shells spanning 17 meters, lit by skylights. Utzon also designed the altar wall of Flensborg bricks, the pine pews and the organ.

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