Every design for Vestby

Vestby lies in the Follo region of Akershus, with Ås a short way to the north-east, Drøbak to the north-west, Ski to the north, Moss to the south and Oslo further up the line. It is the administrative centre of Vestby Municipality, and both the E6 and the Østfold Line run straight through it. The name goes back to the old Vestby farm, the 'west farm', where the first church was built; Østby, Sunnby and Nordby must once have been parts of the same, older farm whose name has been lost.

There is a long memory in this place. Archaeological finds show that the area has been lived in for thousands of years, and Vestby gave Norway the poet and playwright Johan Herman Wessel, the mathematician and cartographer Caspar Wessel and the landscape painter Erik Bodom. Later, many emigrants left for America and settled around what is now Westby, Wisconsin.

Today the village falls into familiar parts: the centre around Vestby Station, Sole south of the tracks, Pepperstad across the E6, Randem to the north and Vestby Church to the west. Grow up here and those names are the map you know by heart, from the station where every trip began to the tracks between Sole and the centre.