In this project I have worked with strategies at regional level, as well as with alterations to an existing building, to strengthen and celebrate rural systems in a place called Naum, in Vara municipality in Västergötland. This I've donein order to challenge the dichotomy of urban and rural. I find that urbanity is very often celebrated in the architectural discipline, and in the public debate in general. There is a strong hierarchy of spaces in the national discourse of Sweden. By focusing on a rural space that I perceive have low status and connect it to networks that reach out to other spaces, cities, and regions, I treat the urban and rural as a continuous variation rather than a fixed binary. The binary is also challenged already by people constantly moving across this scale. Most of the residents of Naum, mapped out herecommute to Vara Town, or other adjacent towns or cities to work, to go school, to go the doctor, take part in cultural events etc. This project focus on the power of rural networks, on movement, and on rural systems of cooperation, and then I am making a number of alterations at a zoomed-in scale, to offer the inhabitants a more intimate relationship to this agricultural landscape. My project operate both at the intimate scale of an existing bygdegård, which is a specifically rural community space, in Naum, as well as on the larger scale of Vara municipality.To the bygdegård I propose three small scale alterations, a sauna called the 'Storytelling Sauna' (SECTION S S) an overnight stay shelter called the 'Please Stay',and an imaginative element of a 'Wisching-Well-Ditch”. In the larger scale I propose a strategic alteration to the treatment of roadsides, to increase biodiversity and human movement. I call this alteration the 'Thriving Passages'. The project also consist of this room-installation that we are all inside of, that aim to represent the different scales and allow us to move across them, and it consists of mappings of bygdegårds in Vara municipality and in Sweden and how they are connected by human movement, as well as mappings of historical and agricultural layers of this landscape.

This qualitative thesis discusses the process of preservation of the community building Källör. In a case study the political processes around the issue of the preservation of the society building is examined on the basis of the concerned laws (PBL & KML), where the protection of cultural-historical buildings is treated in relation to the case of Källör. The voluntary commitment and its significance for the building, is examined through the community center association of Källörs (bygdegårdsförening societetshuset Källörs) work for the building's preservation and goal to run it as a community center (bygdegård). Finally, it is investigated whether and how the place has been important for the involvment of the association. Nine interviews were conducted for the study, six with members of the association and three with professional and responsible persons in the case. Materials in the form of laws, decisions, investigations, brochures and municipal plan overviews were also used for the study. The material was analyzed through the study's theoretical framework; the arm’s length principle (armlängdsprincipen), authority, authenticity, Sense of Place and Genius Loci. The case study shows that the issue of preserving the local cultural heritage is a complex and dynamic process. Those involved can interpret the laws and the cultural-historical value in different ways and the building is not always judged to be objective based on its cultural-historical value. The work of the association has made an impression in the political process and the place has also proven to be important for the associations commitment. The question of the preservation of the local cultural heritage is complex in where laws and collaborations have the potential to be developed, in order to ensure that the local cultural heritage is assessed according to it’s cultural-historical value and thus does not risk being lost. This is a two year master’s thesis in Museum and Cultural Heritage Studies.