Sohlbergplassen

Harald Sohlberg's Winter Night in the Mountains, painted between 1911 and 1914 and voted Norway's national painting, shows the Rondane massif in blue winter light above a dark foreground, and the view he worked from is on the road along Atnsjoen. In 2005 a viewpoint by the architect Carl-Viggo Holmebakk was completed there as part of the Norwegian Scenic Routes programme: a curved concrete platform raised on slender supports and threaded around the existing pine trunks, so that not a single tree was felled to build it. The platform frames the mountains across the lake. It is a short stop rather than a destination, and the design is as much the point as the view.

What's there

• The Rondane view - the massif across Atnsjoen, as Sohlberg painted it.
• The threaded platform - concrete curves built around standing pine trunks.
• The lake foreground - Atnsjoen between the road and the mountains.
• The scenic route design - one of the programme's most admired structures.

When to go

June to September for easy road access; the painting shows a winter scene, and the view in snow is closer to Sohlberg's, though the road and platform are less reliably accessible then.

Good to know

This is a ten-minute stop with a small car park and no facilities. The mountains are frequently in cloud. The platform is the reason architecture enthusiasts come; others may find it a modest roadside pull-in.

Nearby

Rondane National Park lies west; Atna, Folldal and the Osterdalen valley run north and east.

Key facts