seems that this has become my all-time favorite collection of quotes concerning architecture

seems that Finnish architecture books are full of a lot of good stuff...
seems that Finnish architects are aware of the fact that architecture is not only about building houses! especially Reima Pietilä

"Perhaps it is still reasonable to allow that the Classicism of the 20s stands [...]as a pause after Saarinen and a period of preparation for Aalto, in the internationally famed endeavours of Finnish architecture." - Henrik O. Andersson

“In Mies van der Rohe’s warning: ’We don’t need new architecture each Monday.’ I could recognize the gauntled thrown down. Young architecture was to surge forward like a spring flood, silencing the voice of the old. And I suppose the same goes today. And now too, I’m a voice of the old.” - Reima Pietilä

“Neither form, nor space, nor structure can be the starting point when the design method consists of a culturally oriented holistic design.” - Reima Pietilä

“Creativity has been so abused as a cultural term, that it has become a mere empty platitude: ‘creative artist’, ‘creative architect’. Creativity is seen as a kind of ability to find the truth granted only to a few. The idea of Prime creation, of man as demiurge, superman, superior in vigour, is also closely related to this. He is an artist-prince of the late Renaissance and Baroque eras. That is why I avoid the word ‘create’ like the plague. An architect doesn’t CREATE, he SKETCHES, he DESIGNS or 'DRAWS A LINE'." - Reima Pietilä

“Creating architecture is a multi-media process. It involves verbal programming and directing, visualization by sketching floor plans, sections, elevations; spatialization with the help of a scale model; materialization by building. Both words and pictures are used to explain architectural form. Neither on nor the other alone is enough to make architecture as a phenomenon sufficiently comprehensible.” - Reima Pietilä

“Architecture is a particular type of spatial art, a volumic structure of a mega sculpture experienced by moving around and within it.” - Reima Pietilä

“It [Architecture] begins to speak in the language of a synthesis of contextual meanings. But before built architecture can speak for itself, one must speak and communicate on its behalf by using a meta-language of design.” - Reima Pietilä

“An architect who elaborates on the quality and particularly the artistic nature of his architecture soon becomes abstruse, becoming entangled in words. His difficulty being that many important ideas are visual already when they are born, and have developed into specific form through drawing, in other words by non-verbal means. The speaker is compelled to interpret the architectural object-idea indirectly with words. That is no small problem!” - Reima Pietilä

“What can be said, can be said precisely; about that which we cannot say, we are silent” - Wittgenstein

“I think in my native language Finnish. I talk whilst I draw – the rhythm and intonation of Finnish govern the movements of my pencil. Do I draw in Finnish? My language rhythm influences my drawing shapes, phrases my lines, outlines my surfaces. The local cases and regionalistic vocabulary of the Finnish language are the elements of my genuine way to express topological architecture and space.” - Reima Pietilä

“how does architecture function as an element of genius loci and as a part of the natural environment? And the answer is short: as in Dipoli and Suvikumpu. This is of course my individual nature-philosophical anwer, a precedent naturally!” - Reima Pietilä

“The colours and light of the surrounding forest landscape continue in to the architecture. Suvikumpu is ‘naturalistic architecture’. It stimulates nature.” - Reima Pietilä

“It [Dipoli] is contrary to the tried and accepted rules of composition. Defends the right to be different, yet is architecture, and believes that architecture is more than just one (architect-favoured) type of building.” Reima Pietilä

“’The only essential difference is that a car, if proven unsuccessful, will be replaced by a new one, whereas apartments will remain standing for decades to remind future generations of mistaken syntheses’” Pinomaa

“’We can have standardized doors, windows, kitchens, and apartments – the only thing lacking is a standard family of occupants.’” Pinomaa

“It was even assumed that by the year 2000 helicopter vehicles would become common, and for this reason an area for a heliport and service facilities was proposed near the traffic roundabout.”

time lapse experiment I

the video doesn't quite work out as expected so take this link

http://www.flickr.com/photos/40485193@N02/5211178705/

Learning Finnish... writing texts...

Miten minä vietän vapaa-aikana?

Minulla on vähän vapaa-aikana.
Mitä tahansa mina pidän nukkumisesta paljon erikoisesti talvissa, koska ulkolla on pimeä paljon.
Tykkään nauttia minun vapaa-aikana ulkolla: Menen kavelemaan metsässä, kaumpungissa ja merin vieressä, pyöräilemaan ja käymaan lenkillä. Minä olen urheilija. Minä rakastan urheilemisesta. Talvissa mina nautin hiihtämisestä ja lumilautailemisesta. Lisäksi joka vikko mina jodun uimaan. Ulkolla uiminen on hauskaa edes lalvissa. Kuitenkin mina nautin tempuilla pallotja nuijat.Mutta mina rakastan myös tehdä mitään. Tzkkään lukemisesta, piirämisesta ja askarrelemisesta.
Minä voin nautia elämä.Miten minä en pidä?
Minä en viha jotakin todella. Minä en nauti siivoamisesta ja usein mina en halua herätä aikaisin. Minä en pidä bussin ja raitovanun käyttämistä.

yesterday night's fun

my first object-orientated stuff in processing, not useful but it works quite nicely...

city sets - urban visual identity _day 1

exploring Helsinki in a completely new way has started... let's see what the outcome on Friday will be... probably a film... ;-)

random thoughts and a book review

I've read Florians latest post "Wie sind die Vorstellungen von Deutschland?" and immediately started thinking: yeah, and what have been your expectations about Finland. 
well, another thing first: I 've written the book review for my the "history of finnish architecture"-class today (only first part, still have to write 4 6-page essays on different topics... puh!). The book is called: WOOD, STONE AND STEEL Contours of Finnish Architecture.
Therefore I started thinking about what is the essence of architecture in their point of view. And I guess it is that in Finland architecture has always been more related to urban development and urban space than I ever heard at home. Something I have always missed! Great country! (see below this post for details about the book and what I mean in special - it's not a finished version more the first one... but I have to move on to other essays).
Back to Florians question: what is the expectation/imagination/prejudices about Germany?
ok first: we can repair everything. A prejudice that is especially popular among Estonians I guess... have no idea why.
second: everything is clean... and really, to hear that from a Finn is a funny thing... Probably the same thing Florian mentioned about Buenos Aires. In the mornings it is soooo clean and even in the evenings. Unless it is Friday or Saturday (when Finns always get other persons!!!).
third: it seems that everyone wants to live in Berlin... why in hell?? too big, too much people, too few green areas, too dirty! why I understand it: street art!, open-minded people (at least more then in other parts, but I guess its due to the size... ), there is only one city that can regarded to be a city in germany: berlin....


what I didn't think about Finns before I arrived... 
1. they get REALLY crazy on Friday and Saturday evenings... there is no comparison in Germany at all....
2. that they really wear reflectors everywhere (especially since the clock was changed to wintertime last weekend)


and what I just noticed... there is a typical face for Finnish men (not all, but a lot) but not for women! (I haven't seen the typical Finnish women yet... probably that's why I am always considered to be Finnish... and how Vuokko said once: "You are not looking Unfinnish." -> ok!)


and the other thing about today: its Finnish and Swedish Pyhäinpäivää - All Saints' Day/All Souls Day - Allerheiligen. Finnish because it is celebrated on the 1.november everywhere else. But Finns do not like to have public holidays during the week (they would miss a working day) so they celebrate it on the nearest Saturday... And I did not notice it at all: I was wondering that the internet-journey planner did not offer me the normal bus-route to school (I had to go by bus 'cause my bike is broken since yesterday), but did not really think about it. So I took the suggested tram, right in front of my window and went to school, was even wondering on my way that there are so many people drinking on a Saturday morning (but I don't really think about that any more, since Finns just get more crazy then they are normally on the weekends). So I arrived school, wanted to go to the library: closed... didn't think why... there was a handwritten sign: closed on 5/11 from 5pm and 6/11... so wanted to print something at media lab... Of corse I did not know the code for my key so I was standing some minutes in front of the entrance. Then a teacher was coming, also wanting to go inside but did not know her code... and I was telling that I wanted to enter through the library.
she: it's Sunday today!
I: what?
she: All Saint's Day!
ok... I did not know this at all.. Later I tried to enter the shop to buy stuff to repair my bike: closed... normally shops are even open on Sunday... seems that Finns take All Saint's Day, also renamed as All Soul's Day, cause Finns are not catholic at all, very serious. On my way back I realized this lot of flags hanging everywhere... And when I say everywhere I mean everywhere: I also did not realize before that there are flagpoles all around me.. even on a lot of residential buildings (city district of Vallilla is the best example... but it's also a 1930th workers disctrict, so it makes some sence...)... that's what I experienced and learned today... looking forward to Finnish Independence day now... 6/12... I won't forget that!!! =D

Book review

WOOD, STONE AND STEEL Contours of Finnish Architecture. Riitta Nikula. Keuruu: Otava Publishing Company Ltd, 2005. 208

In 2005 the art historian Riita Nikula published her first book trying to give “a general picture of building in Finland over the centuries”: “WOOD, STONE AND STEEL Contours of Finnish Architecture”.

Nikula has been professor in art and architecture history at Helsinki University and wrote her PhD about the Töölö region in Helsinki. She is regarded to be a generalist historian of Finnish architecture and has published books on several different Finnish architectural topics.

In her preface Nikula says she intends to readers who want to get an overview about the situation and the “crucial historical forces behind th[e] building work” in Finland. Her aim is to make the reader understand the countries architectural appearance, inspire them traveling around in Finland and explore Finnish architecture themselves.

The structure of the book follows natural order of centuries, although sometimes it is hard to differ history in that sense: Beginning with a widespread overview of landscape and history, which offers a basic understanding of external drivers, live and building technologies until the Middle Ages, Nikula goes on in chapters of centuries from 16^th to 20^th century. This is still an understandable structure but titling and content of substructures becomes confusing in some different manners: The main interest is obviously in the 19^th and 20^th century, which can considered to be natural in reviewing Finnish architecture, but at least similar main focuses for all the centuries and going more into detail where necessary (19^th and 29^th century) would have been helpful. Especially because of obviously “extra-chapters” such as “[The Vaasa of Carl Axel Setterberg]” already the table of content becomes confusing and the reader is left alone with the same feeling while reading through the book.

He also misses Nikula’s conclusion about what is the essence of Finnish architecture in the end. In the last paragraph she tries to lead the reader’s thinking into future: Nowadays Finnish towns grow but industrial jobs are being shifted to abroad, economy is still restructuring and agriculture a stable component of uncertainty. “All these will affect architecture in Finland in the decades to come.”

What makes it also hard to follow the steps of development is that building types, such as churches, are not treated continuously but within the order of centuries. One has to say that this comment questions the whole book structure, but since it is the decision between sorting things by time or by type, each variant has it's own strengths and weaknesses.

Content wise the chosen topics seem to be very suitable to give an overview about Finnish architecture in general: Nikula emphasizes town and urban development as a big part of architectural and social development throughout the whole book. To me it seems that is the big difference to architectural understanding in other countries: A lot of architects, urban designers and just normal people in other countries do not consider urban and open space in the way as it is emphasized in “WOOD, STEEL AND STONE Contours of Finnish Architecture” already since the 16^th century and in Finnish society in general. This can considered being my personal essence of the book. In comparison to what I have learned about and seen in central Europe’s architectural history, urban development seems to be more in the focus of decision-making in Finland.

The way Nikula explains facts to the reader and relates them inside the subchapters is very easy to understand, even for a reader who is not familiar with features of Finnish architecture. At the same time she uses some architectural terms the reader has to know, but since architecture is a big part of everyday life one can consider the reader to know most of them.

For each chapter Nikula gives a broad overview of what happened in social life and technical development, and what that means to building and architecture, before leading to the subchapters. Whereas these descriptions are very short and therefore easy to keep in mind while reading through the chapter, the reader feels bombed with facts of building years in the subchapters: on page 41 there are mentioned seven churches and eleven years related to them. The exact dates might be interesting to historians, but to inspire “usual” readers exploring architecture it would have been more interesting to relate and compare the buildings as steps of development in a meaningful manner. Sometimes the reader even wished to get less but more detailed examples, but since this book is made to give an overview it might be ok that way. The most important point about that is that text and figures would have been more obviously related to each other. Since there are no figure numbers that could be mentioned in the text, it is hard to follow figures while reading. Nevertheless the reader enjoys having pictures and since architecture is a lot about visual sense making and I as a foreigner am not very familiar to Finnish geography, would have wished to have more maps explaining where several places are. For the reader who wants to travel through Finland because he has read Nikula’s book, it would also be good to have two more things: First footnotes for further reading and secondly a table of places in the end of the book, where he could find the mentioned places sort by city or region.

In general it can be said that in her book “WOOD, STONE AND STEEL Contours of Finnish Architecture” Riitta Nikula achieves the goal to make readers interested in Finnish architectural development. I have myself taken a lot of notes about places I want to see and why. Although for planning a tour through Finland the reader needs further information, Nikula’s book is a good starting point to get to know one’s own interests. Since it is not the book’s aim to be a tour guide through Finland, it can be said that Nikula succeeded although there are weaknesses in relating text to pictures and places to each other, and ordering the content.

my new project: Visualizing My Personal Movement in Helsinki

here is the first sketch for my new project for DVD (dynamic visual design).
I am going to visualize my everyday movement in Helsinki and even show if I went by bike, public transport or on foot. that's the example of today (home - otaniemi: bike; otaniemi - home: foot [my bike is broken]).

It's gonna be in different scales and I also want to add somehow how long I stayed in the places...
in the end (whenever it is) I will try to make an animation out of this. I found this very good one http://www.cartogrammar.com/blog/mapping-a-whole-darn-year/
but he is not considering scale. And I want to! And I would like to animate it somehow that you also see the order I did the ways (the line could be drawn...)... that's it at the moment... I am gonna continue trying to remember my ways during the last days.... =D


so I continued for a couple of hours... and here is what came out until now

scale 1

scale 2 _ var 1

scale 2 _ var 2

scale 3

just imagine there would be different scales.. there are not yet, but different detailing in the plans and in the more detailed plans I can also visualize the speed of motion

SECRETS OF FINNISH LANGUAGE - PART 5

why in hell are Finns using:
Käydään mökillä BUT uidaan järvessä??
first käydään mökillä
käydään = let's go to the cottage... question: where to? so it should be illative or allative and since a mökki is a closed space (at least it should be) I would like to take illative: mökiin... why not?


second uidaan järvessä
uidaan =let's swim... question: where? so it should also be inessive or adessive and since a lake is a open space I would like to take adessive: järvellä

so: who explains???

Dead Drops: The Offline File-Sharing Network
http://popupcity.net/2010/10/dead-drops-the-offline-file-sharing-network/

routes through finland

http://suse-m.blogspot.com/p/routes-through-finland.html

trip to tampere and hämeenlinna

my trip to Tampere and Hämeenlinna

book I want to have!!

Urban pioneers: 

Berlin: Stadtentwicklung durch Zwischennutzung

Senatsverwaltung für Stadtentwicklung, 2007

Skate parks in abandoned industrial zones, ponies grazing alongside the former Berlin Wall, flea markets in empty warehouses, music and fashion shows in hard-to-rent retail locations and climbing walls in development niches--scarcely a city in Europe has made such radically widespread use of "temporary use" projects as has Berlin in the last few decades. The idea of temporary use--which has been defined as "activity in spaces currently unsuitable or undesirable in mainstream economic cycles"--is of increasing strategic importance for urban development around the world, as individuals and government agencies pioneer new prospects at disused sites that defy traditional urban planning. Urban Pioneers documents more than 40 such projects in the city of Berlin, and comes with a series of essays and interviews that offer comprehensive, timely insight into the subject, proposing new guidelines for shaping urban development.

new secrets of Finnish language

Forms of verbs and nouns... just playing around with different sentence types I learned till now. So everything is made by just: You - Work (as verb or noun)... that's it basically! just some additions!

Sinulla on työtä. - You have work.
Sinulla on työpaikka. - You have a job (literally: workplace)
Sinä olen työssä. - You are at work.
Sinä teet paljon työtä. - You work a lot.
Sinä tarvitset työtä. - You need to work.
Sinun täytyy tehdä työtä. - You have to work.
Sinun ei tarvitse tehdä työtä. - You don't have to work.
Sinun ei tarvitse olla työssä. - You don't have to be at work.

wow Finns... that's everything I figured out that I learned it untill now! But don't think I did it by heart... I do have a good grammar book, made myself!

all forms of just one word! holy shit!
http://users.jyu.fi/~hetahein/tiede/verbikaava.html

finnish tongue twisters

shit...
Jaakko started teaching me Finnish tongue twisters today (the real ones, not the ones all the non-finnish speaking humans would think about... most of that words are even used in everyday life ;-) )
And Heli sent me a link with 77 Finnish tongue twisters! http://www.uebersetzung.at/twister/fi.htm#O101035

my favourites for the moment:

Yksikseskös itkeskelet, itsekseskös yskiskelet?
Are you crying all alone, are you coughing by yourself?
they say it's a test about your alkohol level. I can't even do it without any alkohol...

Kokko, kokoo koko kokko kokoon!
- Koko kokkoko?
- Koko kokko.
Kokko (a surname), gather up the whole bonfire!  
-The entire bonfire? 
- The entire bonfire. 

Keksijä Keksi keksi keksin keksittyään keksin keksijä Keksi keksi keksin keksityksi
Inventor Cookie, invented the cookie. After inventor Cookie had invented the cookie, he invented that the cookie was invented.

Ääliö, älä lyö, ööliä läikkyy!
Idiot, don't hit, beer spills!

Hääyöaieuutinen
Wedding night intention news (it is said you find it in the yellow press)

the longest finnish non-compound but totally senseless word:
Epäjärjestelmällistyttämättömyydellänsäkään
es nicht, dass er nicht jemanden zu setzen jemanden, der sich desorganisiert You know? senseless!

what Jaakko teached me so far:
Hääyöaie - we had that already!
matalalattiaraitiovaunu - lowfloortram
alavilla mailla hallan vaara - low-lying land frost risk
and his "all time favourite collection of suffixes: istahtaisinkohan = I wonder if I should sit down for a while." (quote Jaakko)
you see he is teaching me nonsense!

lerning a secret crazy language: Finnish

who still wants to tell me that Finnish language is not crazy (=who really understands the different between the following examples??):
Luen kirjaa. - I read a book (at the moment or only part of it)
Luen kirjan. - I read a book. (the whole book... or the plan to read the whole book)
Luen kirjat. - I read all books. (or whatever... I'm not sure what they mean...)

my field trip with history of finnish architecture class

it was a fun day and a fun trip.
We saw a lot, nevertheless it felt a bit like being a japanese tourist: hop off the bus, take a picture, visit buildings for several minutes, hopp back on the bus - where do we go next?
I was especially impressed by Viikki church. You really can't explain it just with pictures! I am sure that the architects even designed the sound of the doors! They really ask for touching them! Great special construction! then it is about smell! the smell of wood makes you instantly feel safe. It is about light! It is about space! The ceiling is really great! Great church!
But I also liked Myyrmäki church! That's only about light and space! You instantly get the feeling of holyness!

And I learned about housing projects. My first Finnish garden city: Tapiola. lovely place, but todays masses of cars are a big problem over there. Nevertheless it seems that Finns still want to live there. And notice it was build in the 1950th! (that's also pretty old in Finland)

Probably I still have to say something about the geographical centre of Helsinki. It is Viiki, somewhere in the middle of nowhere. It is some kilometers to the north-east from todays centre of Helsinki. Helsinki universitys campus for agriculture is located over there... and it is a very agricultural landscape! ;-)

Ah yeah and I want to say something about Malmi airport. I heard the story that they want to close it completely because they need the field for new residential housing. And the second thing my teacher told me: it is the same thing you've had in Berlin some years ago... Well, NO its not! Tempelhof hasn't had any force to use it for housing. Berlin has no need for new residential buildings! But Berlin has need for public parks and gardens... In Helsinki it is the other way around: They do have a lot of green in the city but they have need for residential buidlings... So if you really need the field: use it!

It seems that I slowly start to understand main features of Finnish architecture. It is about space and about light.. It is about sensitivity!!! that's the key point! Probably I am going to write about that for the essays. We have to write a book review and 5 essays on different topics. My somehow favourite essay topic:
Choose two buildings which you think represent Finnish identity, write a description and analyse the features that create the identity
what in hell is Finnish identity??? Any of you Finnish people want to answer that question for me? Probably I am going to write 10 pages about Finnish identity before starting to describe any building! I don't know... funny topic!

back from field trip, todays sightseeing points: 
Wooden Käpylä(1920-25), 
Olympic Village (1939-40), 
Vallila library an kindergarten (1991), 
Arabianranta, 
Vanhakaupunki, 
Info centre Viikki (1999), 
Wooden apartment blocks Viikki (1997), 
Viikki church (2005), 
Malmi airport (1938),
Myyrmäki Church (1984),
Tapiola: 
Ketju housing (1954), 
Sufika and Mantyviita (1954), 
Tapiola church (1965), 
Urn Cemetery (2004), 
Tapiola swimming hall (1965), 
Espoo Cultural centre (1989), 
WG building (1964-74); 


Suvikumpu hosing (1967-69,1982), 
Niittykumpu fire station(1991), 
Otaniemi chapel (1957)

puuh... feels I have seen whole Helsinki, Vaanta and Espoo.. did I?

my first little game

awful graphics but it works...

maybe I am gonna make birds or butterflys out of the circles? who knows....

design update

updated design, links and put my CV here!... took me pretty long to decide, how I want it to be ;)

and 've still not put any of my works...