TANABRU CHURCH
Tanabru, Norway

Type: Competition Entry
Role: Architect

Team: Obra Architects, Don Lawrence Architect, Verte Landskap & Arkitektur.

The experience of the church building can be understood as a sequence of movement from “real” to “ideal” (in the platonic sense), going from the world of things (trees, rocks, people, etc. to the world of ideal entities (euclidean geometric solids) and then to the most perfect of forms (a sphere).
The oculus, the only source of light in the sanctuary, is located at the equinox azimuth of 20 degrees to capture the most amount of light throughout the year.
The envelope of the building is constructed as a simple structure of steel members clad in corrugated aluminum in contrast to the interior which is completely finished in birch panels. The sphere of the sanctuary is built like the hull of a wooden ship using CNC-engineered lumber arches and insulated birch panels for the enclosure.