|
Stakes Building and Senate Properties
Helsinki, Finland
Heikkinen - Komonen Architects
A new office building combines industrial
architecture with modern transparency and flexibility
© Jussi Tiainen
|
For more photos click on 'photos
& drawings' above.
To see the people and products
behind this project click on 'people & products.'
|
Ripe for adaptive reuse, the handsome
brick buildings along the former industrial blocks of Sörnäinen,
Helsinki, are being converted for new functions. Senate Properties
chose a former grain and root vegetable store as the location
for its new head office. The new premises of STAKES were constructed
concurrently.
A main goal for the project team was
to introduce transparency, flexibility, and openness into
the colossal industrial milieu. The organization of the building
revolves around the warehouse structure. Sturdy, mushroom-shaped
columns, sand-blasted to reveal the concrete surface, create
a system of smaller spaces within the open volume of space.
Enlarged windows ensure sufficient sunlight for the interior.
Contrasting with the transparent elements of the project,
the facades retain their solid appearance by covering the
voids with brick-color aluminum screens.
Combining the old elements with new ones
created another challenge. Elevations of the STAKES premises
adapt to the architecture of the old warehouse. The walls
are made of the original brickwork. The windows of the workspaces
are paired and shielded with screens similar to those that
were used in the refurbished part. The only added color in
the building is leaf-green, used along the walls of an eight-story-high
"canyon." The volume slices the building longitudinallyall
of the buildings circulation, conference spaces, and
break rooms are located between the concrete flanks of this
void.
Formal name
of Project:
Stakes Building and Senate Properties
Location:
Helsinki, Finland
Gross square
footage:
310,000 sq ft
Total construction
cost:
$50 million
Owner:
Senate Properties
Architect:
Heikkinen - Komonen Architects
Kristianinkatu 11-13
FIN - 00170 Helsinki
tel.+358 - 9 - 7510 2111
fax.+358 - 9 - 7510 2166
http://www.heikkinen-komonen.fi
|