Architecture is an aspect of video games that many of us may not give a lot of thought, despite it being engineered to influence us and how we move. Designers will be instructed to create a space based on how the developers want us, the players, to react. The tighter and longer a hallway is, the faster we’ll want to move to get out of it. If a room is wide and the ceilings are high, then our gaming brains will immediately tell us, “oh crap, boss fight.”
I’ve wanted to look at architecture in gaming beyond simply exploring the spaces. The details draw me in, they’re what make me Google “walled cities” at one in the morning because standing above the Whiterun gates makes me feel cool. But why does it make me feel that way? What are the hidden bits of real-life history and culture surrounding our quest-givers, our merchants, and our memories? What is fueling our immersion? In a series of articles, I want to investigate each Skyrim city, and what architectural styles and strategies the developers took inspiration from to create the places we know and love almost ten years on.
At the centre of Whiterun hold, a land of grassy tundra and rolling plains, sits the city of Whiterun. It crawls up a hill near the White River, surrounded by a brick wall, crumbling with age, but built to withstand a siege. Stepping across a small drawbridge, we approach the gates. They creak open, and when the loading screen ends, we’re met with the stoney, brazier-lit streets of Whiterun.
We see timber supports, jagged roof tiles, and small windows. Metal brackets are carved into shapes of animals on the doors, and God, do I want a door in my house that looks like that. The roofs are incredibly steep, and there are large eaves that extend over the blacksmith’s building, and connect the alchemist’s to the general store. These characteristics are prominent in the Norwegian architectural style of “Dragestil” or “Dragon Style”. Influenced by medieval architecture from Scandinavia, it was implemented from 1880 to 1910, and was a kind of patriotic branching from other Nordic styles.
The way that Whiterun draws upon Dragestil is prominent in more places than others. We’ve seen the decorations of dragon and horse shapes extending from the rooftops in the city, which is a defining characteristic of the style. However, structures built in the Dragon Style can often be found to have these tall windows, as seen with The Buksnes Church in Norway. In the whole of Skyrim, there is, I believe, one (1) functioning window, and that would be the circular stained glass in the Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary. A slightly transparent texture to the wall, so you can see people moving around on the other side of the sanctuary.
The rest of the windows in the game are shiny-textured panels that function as a light source. The reason for this is the interiors are separate spaces from the exteriors, so the movements of characters outside don’t translate to what we would see indoors, and it would be a pain in the backside to program. So Whiterun has these lovely little small window lattices that are more reminiscent of 16th century England, rather than Nordic Dragestil. As you can probably tell, I adore them.
More examples of Dragestil throughout the world exhibit bright colours, like the Dalen Hotel in Kviteseid, with its incredible orange exterior, or the Villa Balderslund in Balestrand, its wooden panelling sporting a deep red. Even if you spot the light blue chipped paint on many of the city’s pale walls, Whiterun is missing these colours. This might be the designers telling the players that the walls were once painted bright colours, but have come away through the years, as Whiterun has weathered many a storm, and many a story.
As we leave the market, we ascend a set of stone steps and come to find the ancient cherry blossom-like tree, the Gildergreen, at the centre of the Wind District. Wooden lattice archways are built into the circular structure that encloses the tree and the rocks and benches at its trunk. Whiterun’s water system encircles the area, lovingly reminding me of Indiana’s Smallest Park in Parks and Recreation, and a large wooden building catches our eye to the right.
Watching over the city, is the Companions’ Mead Hall, Jorrvaskr. We see a massive Viking ship flipped upside-down, acting as the roof of this building. Ancient shields are hung on the sides, with Dragestil ornaments and carvings adorning the edges of the roof from the top to the pergola in the back courtyard. Those same lattice windows are present all the way around.
There are a few real-world examples of boat-roofed structures, consisting of sheds and huts, rather than large buildings such as Jorrvaskr. The viking ship is inspired by those in the ship museums in Norway and Denmark, and is steeped in the lore of Tamriel. Ysgramor brought his Companions from the northern land of Atmora across the Sea of Ghosts in ships like this to Skyrim, when Tamriel was still an Elven land. Jorrvaskr was one of these ships. Taken up the White River and carried up the hill, the boat was built into the Companions’ home, a community grew around it, and the city of Whiterun was founded.
Continuing past the mead hall, we arrive at a large beautiful structure, situated at the top of a few flights of stone steps. The Jarl’s Palace, Dragonsreach. In my opinion, one of the most distinctive structures in the game.
Something I want to look at, as we approach Dragonsreach, is not yet the castle itself, but rather the style that surrounds the walkway leading to the door. This brings one word to mind — Rivendell.
The flowing curves of the wooden arches in Whiterun have often been compared to those of Rivendell in The Lord of The Rings and The Hobbit trilogies. This “flowing” quality is a known characteristic of Art Nouveau. Art Nouveau is built around the dynamics of a piece, to give the sense of movement.
It has its roots in the floral textile works of William Morris, who designed wallpaper and textiles in a variety of stylised floral patterns. I find myself drawn in particular to France and Romania, where Art Nouveau flourished in the late 1800s and early 1900s. In the railings of a staircase, or a decorative frame of a painting, I can see these curves and movements. And I am reminded of Whiterun, even if the most notable example of the style in the game are these archways. Subtle, not always noted, but an undoubtedly iconic aspect to the castle. Inspired by Rivendell, inspired by Art Nouveau, inspired by floral textiles.
The palace is arranged into tiers, the floors getting smaller as you go up. This can be another characteristic of Dragestil, as seen in “Stave churches”, primarily in Norway. Dragonsreach has decorative details lining the top of the tiled roofs, and I looked for real-world examples specifically similar to this, which led me to a church in Balestrand, Norway.
Now, the history of Dragonsreach involves a king named Olaf One-Eye, who defeated a dragon named Numinex and brought him to Whiterun, where a palace was built to house the captive dragon. Numinex’s skull adorns the main hall, above the Jarl’s throne.
This church in Balestrand has details and an exterior layout to it that definitely reminded me of Dragonsreach, and looking further, I found that the name of this church, is St. Olaf’s Church. Goddammit. Stupid game I love it so much.
The wooden beams that fill the interior of these churches are akin to the supports inside Dragonsreach. The oldest surviving stave churches can go back to the 1100s, and it’s easy to see the inspiration dragestil took from the construction and decoration of the churches. Meanwhile, that dragon shaping and imagery is everywhere, in a few churches across Norway, Denmark and Germany.
One of my favourite things about Dragonsreach, however, is not the castle or the lore, it’s the view as we exit. We are at the perfect angle to catch Bleak Falls Barrow between those mountains near Riverwood. These locations are often where we start our journeys, and the house you buy in Whiterun, even if it’s teeny-tiny, it’s the one I return to.
Whiterun is influenced to the heart by Dragestil, shadows of Art Nouveau, and many Scandinavian themes and secrets. Gaming architecture is another world to explore, and we have a few more cities in Skyrim to explore and learn about. Next, we’ll travel southeast, to the aspen littered hold of The Rift.
Thank you for reading.
