Norway's building industry is in the process of selecting the so-called "Structure of the Century." Candidates for the favourite structure built in the last century in Oslo range from a classic restaurant to a ski jump.
Aker Brygge: This waterfront complex of shops, restaurants, offices and homes started emerging in the 1980s on the site of the former Akers Mek shipyard. It sports a variety of architectural styles, with this building jutting out at the end of the pier. Oslo's City Hall can be seen in the background.
Oslo City Hall: The City Hall itself is a candidate. It took Oslo 30 years to build its city hall, with the project interrupted by the Great Depression and World War II. It finally opened in 1950 in the middle of a public plaza also designed by its architects Arneberg and Poulsson. The grand central lobby is now used as the site for the Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony every December.
Ullevål Hageby: A residential community in Oslo's Ullevål district, built between 1915 and 1922 by Kristiania Havebyselskap. The project originally consisted of 116 buildings with 654 apartments, 29 homes and businesses built around a central square. The complex was patterned after British garden projects.
Seamen's School: This landmark, perched on an eastern hill overlooking Oslo's harbour, was finished in 1913, built after a winning design by architects Bjerke & Eliassen. It was designed as a castle-fortress with four corner towers. It currently houses a graduate school of business.
City Courthouse: Built in 1994 after an architectural contest won by Østgaard Architects. The modern building is eight stories high with a monumental main façade. It's located downtown, two blocks from the federal government complex and just behind another modern building housing newspaper VG.
Oslo Concert House: Home of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Concert House was built in 1977 on a design that Swedish architect G Åbergh proposed as early as 1957. Its acoustics have been criticized, and many feel it deserved a better location than the dense area in the heart of town where it sits, if only to better show off its modern design.
Bank of Norway: The new headquarters for Norway's central bank opened in 1986 after an architectural competition won by Lund and Slaatto. The building takes up nearly an entire city block in the old part of town that's laid out like a grid behind the Akershus Castle and Fortress.
Holmenkollen Ski Jump: This Oslo landmark looms over the city atop the hill called Holmenkollen. Visible from an amazing number of locations all over the Oslo metropolitan area, the ski jump also ranks as Oslo's top tourist attraction. There's been a ski jump at the site for nearly a century, with the current tower dating from 1939. The ski jump has been upgraded as many as 15 times over the years, but stems largely from the Winter Olympics of 1952."I'm sure it will win," Nicholai Conradi, who often skateboards alongside the City Hall told newspaper Aftenposten. "Which other building in the country is better?"
Residents of Bergen and Trondheim, for example, are likely to come up with some candidates. But Oslo's City Hall was the clear favourite among those who voted in the competition sponsored by Norway's building industry.
It grabbed 30.4 percent of the vote. The next-closest candidate, the residential complex known as Ullevål Hageby, won 15 percent.
That was followed by the Ekeberg Restaurant, with 13.6 percent and the Holmenkollen Ski Jump, with 12.8 percent.
Competition leader Leo Nygænen said he was pleased with the participation. "We had more than 1,000 votes in Oslo, plus around 11 from Minnesota, which all went for Holmenkollen," he said.
The new Telenor building in suburban Bærum won the competition in Akershus County.
