Part 13 of a month-long celebration of Women’s History Month
Born in Warsaw, Léonie Geisendorf (1914-2016) made her career in Stockholm after seeking her architectural education in Zurich in the years 1933-38. Her move to Sweden was prompted by a partnership with Swedish classmate Paul Hedqvist. After further education at the Academy of Fine Arts School of Architecture, she opened another partnership, L. & CE Geisendorf, with her husband, Charles Edouard. Together they designed both private and public work, the latter encouraged and thwarted by Stockholm’s changing views of urban renewal. Geisendorf participated in vast urban schemes but also saw projets (like that for a new catholic church, St. Eugenia) scuttled after regulations were put in place to halt the vast demolitions happening in Stockholm. Undaunted, she continued producing radical schemes that stylistically clashed with the historic buildings of the inner city by channelling her one-time employer, Le Corbusier, including projects for a new parliament proposed nearby the Royal Palace. Realized works in her favored Brutalism include the Villa Delin (1966), and St. Görans Gymnasium, (1970, above).
Matters of Taste 