Detail of the project ed. 2024

tikkuri­la-church / Finland

Design­er	Anssi Las­si­la
Loca­tion	Ase­matie 12, 02300 Van­taa, Finland
Nation	Fin­land
Design Team	ARCHI­TECT IN CHARGE: Anssi Las­si­la, OOPEAA PROJECT ARCHI­TECT: Church: Iida Hed­berg, OOPEAA OTH­ER TEAM MEM­BERS, CHURCH: Tan­ja Val­laster, Jari Heikki­nen, Liisa Heinonen, Katha­ri­na Hei­d­kamp, Las­si Siito­nen / OOPEAA COM­PE­TI­TION TEAM: Kazunori Yam­aguchi, Juha Pakkala, Han­na Jahko­nen, Tan­ja Val­laster, Timo Etu­la, Liisa Heinonen / OOPEAA
Year	2021
Pho­to credits	Exte­ri­or images: 1. Han­nu Rytky 2. Marc Goodwin 3. Tuo­mas Uusheimo 4. Han­nu Rytky 5. Marc Goodwin Inte­ri­or images: 1. Tuo­mas Uusheimo 2. Tuo­mas Uusheimo 3. Tuo­mas Uusheimo 4. Marc Goodwin 5. Marc Goodwin

Pho­to external

Project descrip­tion

Tikkuri­la Church is part of a mul­ti­func­tion­al com­plex con­tain­ing a church with a café, meet­ing spaces for the com­mu­ni­ty as well as offices accom­pa­nied with an adjoin­ing apart­ment build­ing offer­ing stu­dent hous­ing and afford­able rental apart­ments with gen­er­ous shared facil­i­ties. Togeth­er, the church and the hous­ing form one uni­ty with a diver­si­ty of func­tions. Locat­ed on the town square, they are part of the trans­for­ma­tion and den­si­fi­ca­tion of down­town Tikkuri­la, one of the fastest grow­ing and eth­ni­cal­ly most diverse areas in met­ro­pol­i­tan Helsinki.
With its live­ly mul­ti­col­ored brick façade and sculp­tur­al shape, the church takes on a strong pres­ence on the town square. Enter­ing in dia­logue with the sur­round­ing build­ings pre­dom­i­nant­ly made with brick, it forms an iden­ti­fy­ing land­mark for the neigh­bor­hood. The scale and vol­ume of the block is at once com­pact and vari­able. The steeply angled pitched roofs with glazed burnt brick form an impor­tant part of the iden­ti­ty of the block and give an autonomous feel to the church in the corner.
The church pro­vides an acces­si­ble and open gath­er­ing place for peo­ple. Offer­ing a sense of com­fort and calm, it also serves as a place to with­draw to from the every­day. The church hall seats 500, and it is pos­si­ble to divide the space to allow for mul­ti­ple simul­ta­ne­ous activ­i­ties. The acoustics are designed to adapt to diverse per­for­mances from sacral ser­mons to small con­certs and large orches­tras and the­atre. The build­ing also con­tains a café, a kids’ cor­ner, and a wing with offices and meet­ing spaces for the com­mu­ni­ty. The yard pro­vides a pleas­ant exten­sion to the spaces.
The build­ing is made to last 200 years. Burnt brick is the main mate­r­i­al in the exte­ri­or. In the inte­ri­ors, con­crete and wood form an inter­est­ing dynam­ic cre­at­ing a cozy and relaxed atmos­phere. In addi­tion to choos­ing mate­ri­als that will endure time well, also social sus­tain­abil­i­ty was key. The shape and the scale of the build­ing reflect the empha­sis on human scale, acces­si­bil­i­ty, and life cycle sus­tain­abil­i­ty. Around the entrances, the scale is low­er and more mod­er­ate, mak­ing them invit­ing and approach­able. It grows big­ger and taller in the part con­tain­ing the main church hall, reach­ing up high towards the light that enters the space in a del­i­cate­ly sub­tle manner.

Explana­to­ry report of the project
Down­load report

Pho­to internal

Tech­ni­cal drawings

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