Stora Hagen in Grängesberg

At the end of the 19th century, Grängesberg was one of the most important places in Sweden. Miners flocked from all over the country in search of work, and the village tripled its population within ten years. It was not easy to accommodate all these people who arrived.
 

Overcrowding was severe, and most miners had to live in simple barracks. Those who lived nearby had to commute. They left home on Monday morning and walked back again after work on Saturday afternoon.
The mining company quickly realized they needed to build decent worker housing as soon as possible. The company’s design office got to work and drew up plans. Influenced by English houses, the new buildings were square-shaped with four apartments, each with its own entrance.
Eventually, two worker streets were built, each with 22 houses, with four apartments in each.
 

North of the community in Källfallet, the first worker street was built with red-painted houses, completed in 1896. Two years later, the worker street in central Grängesberg in Stora Hagen was finished in 1898.
The houses in Stora Hagen were two stories high and built of brick, plastered with rough-textured plaster in a darker yellow-red color, while the windows and doors were finished in a lighter smooth plaster.
The apartments were 50 square meters, with one room and a kitchen. Each apartment also had a woodshed and a cellar. Additionally, they had a small garden where they could grow some vegetables.
The rent was 3 kronor per month, which can be compared to a miner’s salary of between 600 and 1000 kronor per year.
 

The worker housing here became well-known throughout Sweden, and similar housing began to be built in other locations.
 

When the mine eventually closed in 1989, many people moved away to find new jobs, leaving many of the houses empty. The population of Grängesberg has significantly declined since then.
 

The Stora Hagen area was renovated in 1989-90 and is now classified as a site of national interest. In one of the houses, No. 22, the local heritage society has set up a residential museum. It is called *Gruvfolket* (“The Mining People”), where visitors can get an idea of how a miner’s family lived at the end of the 19th century.
There is also an apartment from 1963 that showcases the development and how people lived more than 60 years later.
 

The house also contains a memorial room for social democrat and miner Bernhard Eriksson (1878–1952), whom Hjalmar Branting, in his first cabinet, appointed as Minister of Naval Defense in 1920.
 

The other houses on the worker street in Källfallet stood empty and abandoned for many years and were eventually threatened with demolition. When the people of Grängesberg heard about this, they formed a village association to buy and save Källfallet’s houses. Now, all the houses there have been sold, and the village association has achieved its goal.
 

FACTS
An old worker street with worker housing from 1895, built in the English style.
A museum in one of the houses features two miner’s residences, among other exhibits.