Urban Façades

In the Museum of Finnish Architecture, Urban Façades, an exhibition consisting of works by students, will open on for public in June 13. The students at the Department of Architecture of Aalto University have produced façade studies for the address Punanotkonkatu 2. It’s about the old Valmet headquarters (1965) and office building of the former police station, which is presently being torn down in order to provide space for a new residential building.

The exhibition Urban Façades doesn’t take a stand on the architecture of the new building, but its purpose is to arouse a general discussion about the urban image and the significance of the art of building in today’s rapidly changing Helsinki.

“We gave the students a general description of a hypothetical program: a residential building which has commercial space on the street level. The volume was up to the students to define. No floor plans were drawn, something you wouldn’t be able to tell from the submitted works”, professor Jenni Reuter at Aalto University comments.

The site for the design assignment is located next to the Museum of Finnish Architecture in Helsinki, at the intersection of Kasarmikatu and Punanotkonkatu. In the small exhibition hall of the Museum of Finnish Architecture, where the works are shown, there is a window overlooking the construction site in Punanotkonkatu. In June, the old building has already given way to the new one, and the foundation for a new block of flats is being dug.