"If ever the Modern Movement had its Parthenon, it must be Gunnar Asplund's Woodland Crematorium in Stockholm."

— Dan Cruickshank, Ed. AJ Masters of Building, Erik Gunnar Asplund. p100.

"Asplund and Lewerentz had been the joint winners of the competition for the Woodland Cemetery, the new cemetery to the south of Stockholm, in 1915. An initial small chapel, meant to be quite subordinate to the main chapel, once the latter had been built, was erected in time for the consecration in 1920."

— Claes Caldenby and Olof Hultin. Asplund. p66.

The Creator's Words

"It is subordinate already—to the woods. The situation did not permit a building volume large enough to stand out monumnetally against the natural setting. And so—for the avoidance of half-measures—the building was compressed until it modestly subordinated itself, insinuated itself into the woods, surrounded by spruce and pine trees towering to double its own height."

"Outside, in between the tree trunks, one sees only the greyish white of the walls and contrasting with the black shingling of the roof, Carl Milles' beautiful wrought-copper, gold-glittering Angel of Death.

The woodland approach leads straight up to the ante-room, supported by 12 columns, where the mourners gather and wait. The iron-bound doors open and, beyond the iron lattice gate inside one discerns the bright space of the chapel."

— Gunnar Asplund from Claes Caldenby and Olof Hultin. Asplund. p66.