Henning Larsen Architects—the winners of the 2019 European Prize for Architecture—may not be a household name like fellow Danish firm Bjarke Ingel Group (BIG), yet that does not make its designs any less impactful. This is a fact the awards organizers—the European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies and the Chicago Athenaeum—wanted to highlight. Take, for example, Henning Larsen Architects' design of the Stadsberget parking garage in Piteå, Sweden. Similar to BIG's head-turning CopenHill— a waste-energy power plant with a nearly 1,500-foot-long ski slope on its rooftop —Stadsberget takes a banal yet necessary structure such as a parking garage, and adds yet another egalitarian purpose by including a sledding slope along the side for children to enjoy. Completed in 2015, Henning Larsen Architects' Stadsberget predates BIG's CopenHill by two years.
Stadsberget parking garage in Piteå, Sweden.
"Our core goal is a very simple one: to design and build good buildings for the people that use them," says Louis Becker, design principal and partner at Henning Larsen Architects. Becker and Mette Kynne Frandsen took over the firm when, in 2013, founding architect Henning Larsen passed away at the age of 87. "In every project, regardless of scale or type, we aim to strengthen community and improve the quality of life. In the architecture, that means creating engaging spaces that encourage meeting and interaction, but also integrating sustainable solutions."
Enghøj Church in Randers, Denmark, designed by Henning Larsen Architects in 1994.
The crowning of the European Prize for Architecture coincides with Henning Larsen Architects' 60th anniversary. Established in 2010, the European Prize for Architecture is awarded annually to any European architect(s) who have advanced "the principles of humanism and the art of architecture." Henning Larsen Architects is the second Danish winner after Bjarke Ingel, who was the award's first laureate in 2010, while fellow starchitect Santiago Calatrava won the prize in 2015.
"We are delighted to present the European Prize for Architecture to this great Danish firm," said Christian Narkiewicz-Laine, president of the Chicago Athenaeum, in a statement. "Their powerful designs and unique design vision celebrate the best of modernist buildings, which are instantaneously complex, iconic, provocative, and profoundly artistic."
Umeå Museum of Art in Sweden.
Henning Larsen Architects has grown considerably since its founding in 1959. This has meant new offices sprouting up across the globe, from New York City to Hong Kong. The firm's increased presence in the world means it is working on an abundance of projects at any given time. But one that Becker is particularly excited about is the Carl H. Lindner College of Business at the University of Cincinnati, which is slated to open later this year. "It is a project that in many ways represents what we believe architecture to be in the 21st century—open, integrated, and collaborative."
The firm's major previous awards include the 1989 Aga Khan Award for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Riyadh, the 2011 Civic Trust Award for the Wave, and the 2013 European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture for Harpa, a concert hall in Reykjavik, Iceland.