Poetic pragmatism.

Combining a fluid interplay of space with a sober and elegant materiality, Iceland's Supreme Court is a sensuous yet formal abstraction of the country's geology and landscape that take its place in Reykjavik's civic heart.

The most awesomely remote of all European capitals, modern Reykjavik is a mere 100 years old, a puny blink in Iceland's immemorial continuum of rock, sea and sky. Lying on the rugged west coast, it feels like a city at the edge of the known world, surrounded by a bald, primeval landscape scarcely touched by human colonization. Yet amid the apparent desolation there is often unexpected diversity and animation. Lunar tracts of black lava are softened by abundant growths of richly coloured mosses, and clumps of exotic Alaskan lupins swathe the bare hills in startling, indigo profusion. Iceland's perilous geology (the island straddles two of the earth's tectonic plates) is a constant reminder of the potency of nature. Minor earthquakes are common and volcanic activity intermittently restructures the landscape.

Locked in a perpetual tussle with the elements, topography and unpredictable seismic forces, the most memorable Icelandic architecture embodies a gutsy synthesis of pragmatism and poetry. From the earliest turf houses - literally grafted from the earth - to very particular interpretations of Scandinavian functionalism, the natural environment is exploited in an architecture which is paradoxically grandiose in form and painstaking in detail. As Steve Christer, partner in Studio Granda, notes 'there are only two scales in Iceland: the massive and the tiny'.

Despite its geographical isolation, Reykjavik is a powerful centre of gravity. Cupped in a mountainous embrace, the city is home to half of Iceland's 260 000 populace as well as all the country's major commercial, legal, political and cultural institutions. The most recent addition to these is Iceland's Supreme Court, the highest court in the land and the last resort of both civil and criminal appeals, Designed by the young Reykjavik-based partnership of Studio Granda (AR January 1998), the Supreme Court is a remarkably mature reflection of local concerns about the proprieties of imposing law in such a small community, combined with an incisive approach to form, materiality and context. It follows on from Studio Granda's first major civic building in Reykjavik, the City Hall (AR October 1992), which demonstrated similar concerns, allied to a rigorous yet romantic Nordic Modernism.

On a low hill in the centre of Reykjavik, the site faces west over a windswept embankment, dominated by a monumental statue of Ingolfur Arnarsson, the first Icelander. Beyond is the Atlantic Ocean, with thrilling views of receding mountains and the distant Snaefellsjokull glacier. On the other three sides, the site is hemmed in by an accretion of major public and government buildings, including the curiously Art Deco National Theatre to the east, with its monolithic fly tower and sheer walls of black flint and basalt aggregate. To the north is the Arnarhvall (state ministries building) and to the south lies the former National Library, a turn-of-the century exercise in Nordic Classicism by the Danish architect Johannes Magdahl-Nielsen.

The form of the Supreme Court is tacitly shaped by the scale and rhythm of the existing civic landscape, reinforced by imagined pressures of geology, gravity and function. Placed hard along the northern perimeter of the site, the building defines and reinforces the street edge along an east-west axis. It also creates a new enclave of sheltered open space (a precious commodity in northern latitudes) in the form of an urban garden between its southern flank and the National Library. Three storeys high, the building is most physically assertive at its western end, gently diminishing in height and tapering in width as it runs east towards the National Theatre. A smaller two-storey block, topped by a wild roof garden of lava, mosses and lichens, terminates its east end.

Compositionally, the building abstracts the geology and colours of the surrounding landscape, through an uncannily rich and contrasting palette of blacks and greens. Clad in a sensuous, emerald skin of prepatinated copper strips, the upper floors sit on a rusticated plinth formed from black basalt and gabbro, an indigenous green crystalline metamorphic rock. Depending on its location, the stone is finished in different ways. Most of the plinth is roughly and randomly hewn - as if it had just erupted from the ground - apart from the southwest corner, where the basalt is sawn smooth with immense precision to emphasize the main public entrance.

On the long south elevation overlooking the new square, the copper epidermis is gently pulled out from the body of the building. Distended as if in response to an unseen pressure within, the green, reptilian skin of the angled wall plane skews to meet the green of the grassy open space. At the east end, a sculptural, copper-clad spout spectacularly channels rainwater off the main roof on to the rocky roof garden below. (In winter, the water freezes into a huge, curving stalactite several feet thick.)

Internal organization is governed by the imperative separation of public and judiciary. The outcome is two strictly defined enclaves that interlock with the elegant impenetrability of a Chinese puzzle. Public areas are arrayed along a long ramp that winds with slow ceremony up from the double-height reception area to the two courtrooms at first floor (plinth) level. This promenade along the south side of the building provides a microcosmic meditation on the relationship between freedom and constraint. Daylight washes through a series of narrow, vertical slots gouged into the copper skin. The slots offer tantalizing glimpses of the outside world, heightening a sense of imminent compression and confinement. At the ramp's half-landing, momentary release is provided by a prismatic window propelled beyond the protective embrace of the angular, copper-clad wall to furnish a final expansive view of the new garden and the city beyond.

Judges have a separate street entrance on the north elevation. Tucked into the recess of a much larger opening, this becomes a kind of trompe-l'oeil observation on the stature of the judiciary. A private flight of stairs leads directly up to the backstage parts of the courtrooms, such as robing areas, conference rooms and lounges. The judges' lounge is on the curved north-west corner, with breathtaking views out across the Atlantic. Lawyers' lounges and interview rooms are set at the east end of the building, behind the larger of the two courtrooms. The winding ramp terminates at office of the president of the court, which sits above the main public entrance on the south-west corner. Used for state receptions and ceremonial functions, such as the inauguration of the country's president, the office symbolizes the law's importance in Icelandic society (the most ancient democracy in the world). A discreet inaugural balcony embellished with an exquisitely minimal glass balustrade overlooks the garden and city.

Judges also occupy the topmost floor, an exclusive, intimate domain with perimeter cellular offices for judiciary and support staff wrapped around a toplit gallery. Two generously proportioned meeting rooms face west; as a court of appeal, preparation and discussion of the Supreme Court's judgements takes place in these rooms. The tall volume of the library is placed on the significant south-west corner, above the president's office. The library's huge solitary window is treated as a transparent lantern, notched in the massive basalt walls.

Public and judicial domains finally converge in the cloistered chambers of the two courtrooms. Yet a measure of physical separation still prevails. Judges enter each courtroom from a door behind a raised, curved table and the public enter from the ramp. In the larger courtroom, the most important space is neither the judges' bench nor the speaker's podium, but the space in between. The belly-like ceiling subtly dissolves the orthogonal lines of the room, subconsciously focusing attention on the void between the judges and the representatives of the judged. The smaller, secondary courtroom is embedded deep in the heart of the building, but daylight is unexpectedly admitted through a swollen, elliptical shaft which extends up through the judges' floor above. Light falls directly on to the speaker, hinting at the presence of a higher authority, a feeling heightened by the ear-like installation in the north flank wall by Icelandic artist Svavar Bjornsdottir.

Throughout the building, a minimal palette of oak, plaster and steel is combined with polished and fair-faced concrete. The balance of raw and refined finishes reinforces the project's exploration of the space between the relative crudeness of crime and the sophistication of law. Accordingly, the courtrooms are highly orchestrated in their use of materials, becoming precious and rich. Reflecting the high level of craft skills among Icelandic building workers, the level of detailing and construction is uniformly high. Amazingly, the substructure and superstructure were completed during the harshest winter ever recorded. To produce a building in such circumstances takes particular and extraordinary determination. As Christer and Hardardottir observe: 'In the Arctic landscape there are no trees, buildings or roads, and footprints are instantly erased. To survive, one must watch the celestial bodies, focus on the horizon, heed the warning of the winds and make clear and precise judgements. The necessary acuteness of thought and tuning of the senses is equivalent to the practice of architecture, where listening, re-evaluation and production are equally interdependent'.(*) The result is a convincing testimony to the poetic pragmatism of Studio Granda and their craftsman collaborators.

* 1998 John Dinkeloo Memorial Lecture. Michigan, University of Michigan. ed Annette LeCuyer, p42.

Architect Studio Granda, Reykjavik

Project team Steve Christer, Margret Hardardottir, Asdis Agustsdottir, Solveig Berg Bjornsdottir, Johann Einarsson, Haraldur Helgason

Structural engineer Linuhonnun

Mechanical engineer Almenna Verkfraedistofan

Electrical engineer Rafteikning

Landscape consultant Hafsteinn Haflidason

Acoustic consultant Verkfraedistofan Onn

Cost consultant State Building Agency

Photographs Dennis Gilbert/VIEW