We are proud to share that Vik School Library has been shortlisted for this year’s Nordic Architecture Prize, one of five projects selected from more than 200 entries across Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland.

About the project

The library is one big stepped room built from cross-laminated timber. Children read on the stair, classes gather at the bottom and the whole school of 420 pupils fits in for morning assembly.

The jury’s words

The jury described the building as “a room that teaches without lecturing — generous, calm and completely at ease with how children actually use space.” We could not have hoped for a kinder description.

How the stair came about

The idea for the reading stair came from watching pupils in the old library, who ignored the chairs and sat on the floor, the radiators and the window sills. We simply gave them a better floor to sit on: two hundred places on wide timber steps.

Built in timber

The structure is cross-laminated spruce, left exposed inside. The building stores more carbon in its timber than was emitted to build it, and the wood keeps the room acoustically soft even when two classes share it.

The other shortlisted projects

We are in excellent company, alongside a harbour bath in Helsinki, a housing block in Bergen, a crematorium in Malmö and a school in Reykjavík. We have long admired the architects behind all four.

The team

Vik School Library was designed by Ida Kjær, Mads Holm and Søren Vik with structural engineers Søe & Kirk and landscape architects Field Office, and built by Brink Byg for Oslo Municipality.

What happens next

The jury visits all five buildings in September, and the winner will be announced at a ceremony in Copenhagen in October. Whatever the result, the best review is still the rota the teachers had to make for the stair.

Visit the library

The library is open to the public on Saturdays from 10:00 to 14:00. If you are in Oslo, go and sit on the stair for an hour — it is the best way to understand the building.

Thank you to the pupils and teachers of Vik School, who tested every step of the stair long before the jury did — and who still tell us, loudly, when something needs fixing.