In 1871, Skånska Cementaktiebolaget, today's Cementa, was founded in southern Sweden. Then and there, the Swedish cement industry began. A new book from our publishing house Business History Publishing tells the history of Swedish cement.

During the past 150 years, cement, and its end-product concrete, has become increasingly important for the development of society. Roads, bridges, power stations and not least homes would have been much more difficult and expensive to build without domestic access to cement. It is also a material that has evoked, and still evokes, strong emotions. How sustainable is cement production really, when face with a global climate crisis?

For some, cement and concreted stands for everything that is hard and impersonal. Others see the possibilities and the beauty that exists in such as simple and stable material. Regardless, the building material has become an obvious part of our lives.

On assignment from Cementa, owned by Heidelberg Cement Northern Europe, we mapped out the history of the Swedish cement industry, which resulted in a number of texts published on the company's anniversary site in 2021. These texts have now been published in book form, richly illustrated with photographs from several company archives.

The book is only available at Cementa and is not for sale in the bookstore.