In Andrew Hodgkinson’s recent trip to Copenhagen he visited Arne Jacobsen’s ‘Skovshoved Petrol Station’ (shown in the image on the right). Built in 1937, this petrol station serves as an iconic historic landmark. A monument of ‘early modernist functionalism in Denmark’. In 2006 it won the European Union Prize of Cultural Heritage. Skovshoved Petrol Station is located in the northern outskirts of Copenhagen, Denmark.
It has been restored over the years with the roof and pumps still operating as functioning petrol station. The building itself is now used as an ice cream parlour and café but remains the petrol stations original features (see images below).
Andrew was fascinated by the white cubist unique structure of the petrol station. Particularly when examining it in the time of being built in the Danish ‘functionalisim’ style movement with the first sort of modernism emerging. The reinforced concrete building clad with Meissner white tiles ‘signalling purity and cleanliness’. ‘The petrol station was nicknamed Paddehatten, the Mushroom, because of its ellipse-shaped canopy roof.’ This ‘minor’ project of Jacobsen’s work acted as one of his most impressive functionalist masterpiece for his architecture and recognition.
