Day 9 Part 2 - Helsinki

Continuing from where I left off...

Leto and I continued on from the cemetery back to the center of the city to meet our other teammates. On the way we spotted this little gem of Scandinavian brick work.

As I write this post, I've already seen more examples of clever Scandinavian brick work. These spiral columns were my first glimpse, and I liked what I saw. The column seems to melt out of the wall and looks to be moving, physically twisting its way up and down. Before I give too much credit to the spiral columns, I ought to also draw your attention to the brick pattern in the facade itself. So much playfulness happening in one area - I must be in Europe! I counted at least five different bricklaying patterns in this one image. Do you see them all?

And I still have a few other days to post about before I can get to Alvar Aalto's Experimental House...

We met up with our teammates, who tackled the urban section of our quarter, then proceeded to meet up with the others and the professors. The entire group reconvened at the plaza adjacent to the Helsinki Rail Station (designed by Eliel Saarinen; more about that building to come in future posts). We laid out our sketchbooks and each group discussed their findings. Pablo and Mary Lou (our guest professor for Finland) provided feedback on the quality of our sketches.

(Mary Lou talking about Hank's drawings)

Much of the discussion centered not on what we observed, but how we recorded, in our sketchbooks, what we observed. Drawings are the essential tool of the architect. Words are secondary and since they are often spoken (instead of written), they are less reliable than an image. The challenge with the day's assignment to walk the city was: record more information faster, and with fewer strokes. For me, trying to cram too many drawings onto one page was the biggest obstacle to my sketchbook pages' being understood. It's been seven (or eight?) days since this all happened, and you'll see (hopefully) how I've been working to correct myself.

We did talk about Helsinki itself, of course, and as the discussion wore on, one thing became evident: Helsinki does not have a defining landmark building. New York City has the Empire State Building, London has Parliament, Paris, Rome, and so on, but Helsinki lacks an icon. Judging from postcards, there are a few buildings vying for the spot. The Rail Station, the Helsinki Cathedral and the Finnish Parliament building all seem to get about the same coverage. I would give the spot to the Cathedral. Like the Finnish Parliament, it's enormous and the steps leading up to the entrance are daunting, but the Cathedral is stunning and the relationship between interior and exterior geometry is manageable but the scale makes it compelling.

The discussing lasted a few hours, and by the time it ended we were famished and in need of some good Helsinki eatin'. Some of us headed deeper into the center of the city in search of food. We found ourselves in a smaller square ringed by cafes, bars and a mall. In the center was a fifteen-feet high egg-shaped sculpture that I found rather uninteresting as an object, but as a texture, fascinating.

The photo was taken by sticking my camera through one of the rhombuses and pointing up. Some graffiti made me smile.

The words are in English, which leads me to think this was not written by a Finn. I'd even go so far as to say American, since I think we're quicker to use (and write out) this: <3 which is meant to be a heart, if anyone does not know.  I wonder if I'm right?

Very close to the sculpture, we found a surprising and disturbing sight. We're still not sure if this is a yearly event at this plaza, or an art installation. I made a panorama out of it, since it seemed deserving of a representation worthy of its hugeness.

The massive pile seemed to be akin to a poor quality dump swap where people bring old appliances or books or children's toys and take something that they like. We didn't see anyone take or leave anything, but we did see some people walking around among the junk, rummaging for something useful to them. The city is already pretty clean, so this pile dramatically offset the normally uncluttered streets.

Two more curious findings awaited us in the mall, where we found dinner. The first was a special map of the mall for blind people. Not merely a list of shops in braille, this map included plans of the mall with different textures for different areas.

The second curiosity met us at the dining area. Unlike America, where all of the eateries share a large common area and are open to each other, these eateries clearly defined their territories with glass walls. That in itself, as a cultural oddity, was strange, but I was drawing to the glass curtains themselves, which moved about on a track and could be pulled across to close off the eatery while maintaining visual connections. Some of them were stored at one end of the track, like so:

Where several walls intersected, the track system became increasingly complex. I had a fun time trying to untangle this bit:

It must take some special skill to move all that glass!

That concludes Day 9 in Helsinki.  Day 10 coming soon.. when the architectural explorations get into full swing!