Wingårdhs is a Swedish enterprise, specialized in architecture, urban planning, interior design and landscape planning. Gert Wingårdh, architect SAR/MSA and CEO, is the company’s founder and owner.
The office is today among the five largest architect groups in Sweden, and among the ten largest in the Nordic Region. This falls well in line with the target set in the office’s general objectives that we must be one of Scandinavia’s leading architecture firms.
Wingårdhs has been operating in Gothenburg since 1977, in Stockholm since 1985 and in Malmö since 2011.
We employ 50/50 women in our 150+ staff, architects, interior designers, constructional engineers, visualisers, data technicians, model makers, a spatial planner, an architectural historian, administrators and trainees. We come from numerous different countries on many continents. Most of us are working in Gothenburg, a lot in Stockholm and some in Malmö. We are a knowledge company where it is commonplace for employees to assume great responsibility.
We are in a state of growth. The office has an expressed objective of recruiting personnel primarily from the younger generation. This gives everyone a chance to assume responsibility and to develop within a range of projects. We have established a very sound organizational structure.
The office works on all types of projects, from product development (e.g. Volvo’s stands at international auto shows) and interior design (e.g. Vinge law firm in Gothenburg) to large structures (e.g. Emporia shopping center in Malmö) and urban planning projects (e.g. Havneholmen in Copenhagen).
We work on projects in all phases, from pilot studies and surveys to finished construction documents. The office has extensive experience working with both renovation and new construction. Our clients are private businesses, government authorities, municipalities, real estate developers, building contractors, and private individuals.
A large proportion of our clients are returning customers, such as AstraZeneca, Ericsson, Volvo, Statens Fastighetsverk (Swedish National Property Board), AP, Riksbyggen (the Cooperative Housing Organization of the Swedish Trade Unions), HSB, SKB, Steen & Strøm, and others. Today the office has great expertise in working throughout Sweden and internationally. We have executed projects in Denmark (housing and offices), Finland (housing), England (offices and theme park), Germany (visitor center/aquarium and sculpture museum), the United States (houses), and China (offices and R&D). Within the framework of projects for two large clients, Ericsson and Volvo, we are working in some thirty other countries around the world.
Competitions represent a large part of the office’s business operations. The majority of projects we carry out follow from competitions we have won. We compete both domestically and internationally.
The company was founded in 1977 and has grown slowly
It began with small assignments for private homes, retail interiors, and restaurants. There followed a series of department store interiors for NK in Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö and shopping centers such as Kompassen in central Gothenburg. These led to hotel remodeling and design commissions such as the Kramer in Malmö and the Scandic Crown Slussen in Stockholm.
In 1988 a new era began
The firm’s first new construction project, Öijared Golf Club in Lerum, was awarded our first Kasper Salin Prize (Sweden’s major architectural award). It was also the beginning of our major commission for the Swedish research and industrial giant AstraZeneca in Mölndal, with laboratories, offices, conference facilities, etc. It won the Kasper Salin Prize in 1993. R&D facilities continued to be a primary project type for the firm, with buildings for AstraZeneca Research Center Boston (awarded the Laboratory of the Year in the U.S. in 2001). And telecom leader Ericsson became a major client, with projects in Borås, Lund, Stockholm, Mölndal, London, Athens, Madrid, Paris, Tokyo, New York, and Beijing.
In the 90S, the range of projects broadened
The 1990s brought a number of public commissions for counties, such as our award-winning cultural centers and schools in Ale, Kungälv, and Kungsbacka (all near Gothenburg). We built residential developments in Stockholm, Gothenburg, Helsingborg, Malmö, and many other cities. These led to commissions for government agencies such as the Swedish Civil Aviation Administration, a new 85-meter-high control tower at Stockholm Arlanda Airport, and embassies in Berlin (1999) and Washington, DC (2007) for the National Property Board, both awarded the Kasper Salin Prize.
Today, many years later
We are now a leading problem-solver in architecture and urbanism with three offices and numerous professionals. We have built acclaimed science centers in Sweden and abroad, and a department store in Vällingby (Stockholm) that was honored as the best building for shopping in the world at the World Architecture Festival in 2009. This recognition was repeated in 2012 for Victoria Tower (Stockholm) in the hotel category and in 2013 for Emporia Shopping Centre (Malmö).