location
Helsinki, Finland
client
Helsinki Workers’ Association, HTY
Status
Completed in 2012
Building area
13,500 m2
award
Wienerberger Brick Award 2014, The Chicago Athenaeum International Architecture Award 2013
The Paasitorni building was originally designed in the early 1900s by architect Karl Lindahl to house the Helsinki Workers’ Association. The iconic building underwent careful transformation to conference center and a hotel space with 170 rooms in 2012. Collaborating with Helsinki City Museum and Finland’s National Board of Antiquities, K2S designed a plan where parts of the existing building were converted into hotel spaces, but the most radical change took place in the courtyard where an existing building was replaced by a completely new hotel wing. The contemporary addition to the existing historical elements of the building is an ivory-white, custom-made brick wall that has been designed to glow like a snow lantern at night.
The inner courtyard was previously used mainly as a service yard. Now the innercourtyard and the first under ground level have been turned into a new heart for the whole block.
The hotel is located in three parts of the quarters – the twenties, the fifties and 2012.
Existing ornamentation was an inspiration to contemporary structures and textures.
On two sides of building the brick facade turns into brick ”lace” which functions as a filtering layer between the rooms and the inner court yard.
The geometry of the new wing is softly curving in order to allow flow of space and light.
The hotel and conference spaces and completely new level for logistics and service has been built below the sea level.
The lively surface texture of the brick was developed for this particular use.
The design philosophy concentrates in respecting the listed buildings and in adding a unique contemporary layer of architecture inside the exiting framework.
The roof windows – “the light ponds”- give a new character to the space as well as provide natural light and space to the underground level.
