Architecture at Chalmers has a 160-year history. It is thus the oldest of the four Swedish schools of architecture today.
Over such a long period both the profession and the teaching of it have of course changed several times. What follows is an attempt to describe these changes in very brief form, organized around ten moments in time that were of some importance for the development of the subject.
As manifold as such a development may be it is nevertheless tempting to try to summarize it and look for some typifying characteristics, however provisional. In economic history and human geography there is a concept called “path dependency.” The idea is that institutions (not only in the academic sense but also companies, for example, or cities or regions) have a certain built-in inertia that makes them continue along the same path. There is always a culture carried by people but also “institutionalized” in courses, faculty positions, administration, and buildings. History matters.
Sweden
