Snøhetta (company)


Snøhetta AS is a Norwegian architectural firm headquartered in Oslo, Norway.

History

The company was formed in 1987 by Kjetil Thorsen and a group of young architects. They named it Snøhetta after the tallest mountain in the Dovrefjell National Park. In 1989 they joined forces with New York architect, Craig Dykers, to enter the competition to design a replacement for the Library of Alexandria.

Union busting

On July 7, 2023, after months of campaigning, a group of employees at Snøhetta's New York office where able to coordinate a vote on unionizing and joining Architectural Workers United a division of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. 29 votes where cast in favor of Unionizing, while 35 votes where cast in opposition. Prior to the vote several prominent Architectural firms had voted in favor of unionization, namely; SHoP, Bernheimer Architecture, and Sage and Coombe Architects, with the defeat of the vote at Snøhetta largely ending the trend. After the vote several employees filed a complaint to the National Labor Relations Board stating they where being discriminated against at work by management due to their support of Unionization, the lawsuit was defeated. Later in 2026 the IAM stated that Snøhetta has retained a prominent union busting law firm, even after the vote specifically to defeat discrimination lawsuits.
On January 21, 2026, eight former employees of Snøhetta again filed to the NLRB stating they had been fired due to their support of the pro-Unionization campaign. This time the IAM has taken a more active role in the legal battles, accusing Snøhetta of "repressing the rights of their employees" and that there will be "consequences." Snøhetta denies the accusations, stating the firings where part of routine downsizing. Snøhetta then went on to release a statement that they support members of the firm joining unions in Norway, but not the United States, because "participation in unions in Norway does not require collective action."

Awards

Snøhetta has received the World Architecture Award for the Bibliotheca Alexandrina and the Oslo Opera House, and the Aga Khan Award for Architecture for the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. Since its completion in 2008, the Oslo Opera House has also been awarded the Mies [van der Rohe Award], the EDRA Great Places Award, the European Prize for Urban Public Space, In 2010, through Kjetil Trædal Thorsen’s lead, Snøhetta’s works’ coherence with their environment was awarded the Global Award for Sustainable Architecture, both from an international point of view, for their large scale projects, and at a local, small projects scale.

Notable works