Norsjö kyrka

The story of Norsjö's churches is one of persistence in the face of disaster. The first church here was a simple log-built chapel erected in 1811. By the early nineteenth century it had fallen into poor repair, and in 1845 the architect Johan Fredrik Åbom was commissioned to design a replacement. That cross-shaped timber church, with a central tower, was built in 1848–50, later restored and moved to the present church site in 1906, and reconsecrated in 1911. Disaster struck the following year when lightning set the church and its bell tower ablaze, destroying them completely.

A new church was built in 1915 to designs by the architect Fredrik Falkenberg, but extraordinarily this too burned down, a month before its planned consecration, for reasons that were never established. The site of these earlier churches, some three kilometres outside the modern village, is now marked by a memorial grove.

Undeterred, the parish rebuilt once more to Falkenberg's plans, and the present church was constructed in 1916–17 by master builders Karl Markgren and R. Hedström of Skellefteå. It was consecrated on 27 July 1917 by Bishop Olof Bergqvist. The building has a broad, almost square plan with short, wide transepts suggesting a central-church form, red-painted timber cladding, closely divided window panes, and a steep, red-tiled roof topped by an onion-domed bell turret.

Inside, the single nave is covered by a tall, smooth-panelled trefoil vault supported on sturdy round-timber pillars. The chancel, set to the northwest, is notably tall and narrow, separated from the nave by arched openings on slender columns, and richly decorated with painted ornament and figurative scenes by the artist Yngve Lundström. Its chancel window, almost seven metres high, carries painted motifs of Norsjö designed by the architect himself. The colour scheme throughout — green woodwork, English red on the columns, and pews in green and brown — is said to survive largely as originally conceived, with only careful cleaning and retouching carried out in the early 1960s.

Several furnishings deserve a visitor's attention: the pulpit, altar cabinet, hymn-number boards and organ case were all made by the local joiner Axel Finnberg, with the altar cabinet's carved figures by the sculptor Otto Strandman. A more unusual item is the christening bowl, donated by the skier Henning Isaksson — reputedly a prize he had won after taking the Swedish 60 km championship three years running. The church also contains an organ built in 1988 by Grönlunds Orgelbyggeri of Gammelstad.