Sauna culture

Sauna bathing is an essen­tial part of Finnish culture and national iden­tity. There are only 5,4 million Finns but 3,3 million saunas. Public saunas used to be common in bigger cities but now that most new apart­ments have a sauna of their own, public saunas have decreased drama­ti­cally in number. There are only a few remai­ning. As a sense of commu­nity is beco­ming a more and more important part of new urban culture, many new public saunas are being planned. With Löyly (meaning: the steam you get when thro­wing water on hot stones in a sauna) Helsinki will offer foreign visi­tors a public sauna expe­ri­ence all year round — a must when visi­ting Finland.

Process

The project started from the city of Helsinki initia­tive. Herne­saari is a former indus­trial area on the Helsinki seashore that is being deve­loped into a resi­den­tial area. New uses are being deve­loped for the area, while waiting for future changes to come. There is a cruise ship harbor in Herne­saari. The city wanted to acti­vate the area with new func­tions and to serve visi­tors with new attrac­tions. avanto archi­tects started the project in 2011 desig­ning a tempo­rary sauna village at the further­most end of the penin­sula. The concept could not prove finan­cial sustaina­bi­lity, so the first client did quit the project. avanto archi­tects deve­loped a floa­ting sauna for the second client, but the concept was not realizable as the site faces the open sea and a floa­ting struc­ture couldn’t with­stand high waves and pres­sure from ice packs. The coast­line will change with future deve­lo­p­ment, but the city chose an area where the shore­line will remain the same. The archi­tects deve­loped a new free form concept with trian­gular faces. The client changed once more and, as actor Jasper Pääk­könen and Member of Parlia­ment Antero Vartia finally got funding, the cons­truc­tion works could begin.

CURRENT CITY STRUCTURE

Context

The site is unique. Being less than two kilo­me­ters away from the city centre, it is very central but at the same time the land­scape is like in the outer archi­pe­lago. The plot is situated in a future coastal park that will be part of a broader “Helsinki Park” connec­ting the capital city to the sea. The buil­ding was desi­gned to be slim and elon­gated so as not to cut the narrow park strip. The volume is kept as low as possible so that it doesn’t block views from the future resi­den­tial blocks. Instead of buil­ding a conven­tional buil­ding, the sauna is deve­loped into an easy-going, faceted cons­truc­tion that is more part of the park than a conven­tional buil­ding. When the wooden buil­ding turns gray, it will become more like a rock on the shore­line.

Architecture

The archi­tec­tural idea is simple: A rectan­gular black box contai­ning the warm spaces is covered with a free formed wooden “cloak”. Instead of being mere deco­ra­tion, the sculp­tural struc­ture made of heat treated pine has several func­tions. It provides people with visual privacy. However, the lamellas don’t limit the sea view from inside it, rather they func­tion like vene­tian blinds and blocking the views from outside. There are shel­tered outside areas between the warm mass and cloak to cool down in between sauna bathing. The cloak forms inti­mate terraces between its slopes that serve as a place to sit. The struc­ture protects the buil­ding from the harsh coastal climate. It shades the inte­rior spaces with big glass surface and helps to reduce the use of energy to cool the buil­ding. Moreover, the stepped cloak forms stairs to climb on to the roof and terraces on top of the buil­ding. The cons­truc­tion forms a big outdoor audi­to­rium for the future marine sports centre’s acti­vi­ties on sea. There are around 4,000 planks that were precisely cut to indi­vi­dual forms by a computer-controlled machine. The big wooden terrace is partly on top of the sea. You can hear the sound of the waves under your feet.

Spatiality

The buil­ding consists of two parts: public saunas and restau­rant. The saunas and public spaces open up to the sea, with inte­res­ting views to city center and the open sea. The atmo­sphere is calm and the spaces dimly lit. Diffe­rent areas are conceived as spaces within a space. Inte­res­ting views open between closed spaces as you move from one area to the next.

Dres­sing rooms and showers are sepa­rate for men and women. A leather curtain cove­ring the door indi­cates entry into the unisex area, at which point visi­tors need to wear a bathing suit. Tradi­tio­nally men and women bath sepa­ra­tely and naked. avanto archi­tects deve­loped a sauna culture where bathing toge­ther with your friends not depen­ding on gender is possible.

Interior

The inte­rior archi­tec­ture of the restau­rant and the sauna lounge is by Joanna Laajisto Crea­tive Studio. The objec­tive of the design was to create an atmo­spheric restau­rant which compli­ments to the building’s strong archi­tec­ture. The approach could be called soft mini­ma­lism. The chall­enge was to create inti­mate seating areas in the large hall like space with two walls of windows. People often feel most comfor­table sitting their backs against the wall. The solu­tion was to build a raised plat­form for the bar area which divides the space into two diffe­rent areas. A wooden half wall anchors the long custom desi­gned sofas which have a great view of the sea.

The main mate­rials used in the inte­riors are black concrete, light Scan­di­na­vian birch wood, blackened steel and wool. All mate­rials are durable and long lasting. The wood used is pressed, glued and slightly heat-treated birch, a sustainable Finnish inno­va­tion made of left over mate­rials of the plywood industry that normally is burned to produce energy. This is how waste is turned into a beau­tiful recy­cled mate­rial. It´s manu­fac­tu­ring process produces a beau­tiful cool light color tone and heavy dura­bi­lity.

Saunas

There are three diffe­rent saunas- All are all heated with wood: a conti­nuously heated sauna, another one heated in the morning and staying warm all day and a tradi­tional smoke sauna – a true rarity in an urban sauna. This is how you can expe­ri­ence all sorts of Finnish Löyly during a single visit. Between the saunas there is a spa area with cold water basin and a fire place room to relax. You can swim in the sea. In winter visi­tors will find an “avanto”, the hole in the ice for winter swim­ming, a popular hobby in Finland – and  the name of the archi­tects’ office name as well.

Sustainability

The buil­ding is heated with district heating and elec­tri­city is produced with water and wind power. The buil­ding is first FSC-certi­fied buil­ding in Finland and second in Scan­di­navia. Forest Steward­ship Council’s certi­fi­cate proves that wood mate­rial comes from respon­sibly managed forests. The restau­rant serves organic food and sustain­ably caught fish.