Stockholm, Sweden from the air
Credit: Henryk Kotowski.

The Swedish government has introduced new architecture and design targets to make Sweden a more “sustainable, equal and less segregated society”.

The targets laid out in the Stamped Living Environment Bill aim to make sustainability and quality integral to the design process.

Architects and designers should share good practice and ensure the public environments they create are accessible to all, the bill states.

“Architecture, form and design will contribute to a sustainable, equal and less segregated society with carefully-styled living environments, all of which are given good conditions for influencing the development of the common environment,” it reads.

It has largely been welcomed by the Swedish architecture and design community, although some concerns have been raised about whether the policy would be enforced.

Swedish architecture and design museum welcomes bill

Kieran Long, the director of Sweden’s national museum and centre for architecture, ArkDes, praised the introduction of the bill.

“Sweden has become one of the most ambitious countries in the world in its belief that design can improve people’s lives,” Long wrote […]