The see-through tower
A frame you can look through — Jacobsen's answer to the argument.
Villy Fink Isaksen — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Villy Fink Isaksen — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Colin — CC BY-SA 4.0 · RhinoMind — CC BY-SA 4.0
A building that divided its city when it opened in 1942, and eighty years later is its foremost architectural symbol. **Arne Jacobsen** and **Erik Møller** won the competition with a design that had **no tower at all** — a clean functionalist volume with no ornament. The public objected: a town hall without a tower is not a town hall. A **60-metre tower** was added, but Jacobsen refused to make it conventional, and built it as an exposed frame covered in a thin grid — a tower you can see through. The argument ran for years. The whole building is clad in **grey Norwegian marble**, an odd choice for a functionalist structure, and it gives it a quiet weight nothing else in the city has. Inside, Jacobsen's small details are the reward: **clocks, door handles, lamps and chairs** all designed for this specific building, many of which later became products sold worldwide. Note: **this is a working government building**, and its public parts open on weekdays only.
A frame you can look through — Jacobsen's answer to the argument.
Clocks, handles and lamps designed for this building alone.
A cladding that gives a functionalist building unmatched weight.
Rådhuspladsen 2, Aarhus
A Danish architect and designer (1902-1971), and the closest thing to a **single face for Danish design**. What set him apart is that he designed the building and everything inside it: the chair, the lamp, the spoon, the door handle, even the lettering on the sign. This city hall produced details that became global products, and Copenhagen's **SAS Royal Hotel** produced the **Swan** and the **Egg** chairs. His **Ant** and **Series 7** chairs have sold in the tens of millions and have never gone out of production. His manner: simple curved lines, no ornament, and everything designed to be used daily.
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