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59.91° N, 10.75° E

Utsikten Tower

Hardangervidda, 2024

A dark timber tower on open autumn moorland

A viewing tower for walkers on the mountain plateau.

Location

Hardangervidda, Norway

Completed

2024

Area

22 m²

Type

Viewing tower

Client

Vidda Trail Association

Photography

Kari Helland

The site

The tower stands on a low rise above the old trail between two mountain huts, where the plateau opens in every direction and there is no shelter from the weather.

The ground is thin moss over bedrock, wet through the summer and frozen for the rest of the year. We set the tower on four steel screw piles so the moor around it could stay untouched, and turned the base so the door faces away from the westerly wind.

A distant house on open moorland under a big sky, in black and white
A timber section model with tiny figures
Section model with the inner stair

The building

A square shaft of charred spruce, eleven metres tall, with a stair winding up the inside walls.

Walkers climb in near darkness, with light falling only through the gaps between the boards, until the stair arrives at one angled glazed opening that frames the distant line of the glacier. The charred cladding needs no treatment and will grey slowly in the wind. Every part was flown in by helicopter, in pieces two people could lift.

People used to walk straight past this rise. Now they stop, climb and stay.

Gunnar Moen, trail warden

Materials

Cladding

Charred spruce, left untreated

Structure

Glulam frame on steel screw piles

Stair

Pine treads on steel stringers

Opening

One angled pane in an oak frame

Credits

Architects

Eirik Fjellheim, Jun Sato

Engineer

Fjellstad Konstruksjon, Bergen

Builder

Eidfjord Tre og Bygg, Eidfjord