Helsinki Central Library
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Type: Competition
Author: Radionica arhitekture
Design team: Maja Bencetić, Josipa Brdar, Fani Frković, Iva Pejić, Goran Rako, Josip Sabolić
Designed: 2013
Area: 16.500 m2


We noticed that the Töölönlahti area is a special place in Helsinki. We understand the importance of this “emptiness” in the heart of the city and we think it is equally or even more important than the unique buildings surrounding it. Our wish is to keep the identity of this “emptiness”, pedestrian, cycling, green. It will be the last note of the Töölönlahti area chord, the final piece that will round and close Töölönlahti “void”. This house wants to be an important new architectural place in Helsinki, but with respect for its surroundings.
By building a house in the park, we also tend to bring the park into the house and in such a way the greenery and the Library can “work” together the whole year round, just like plants from the south live in northern botanical gardens during the winter. The Mediterranean character of the interior of the Library is not accidental. It is a conscious “infusion” of the small part of the Mediterranean Sea into the Baltic.
The structuralist order is used to form the terraces and intimate spaces that flow one into another. The functional units we distributed over the “hanging gardens”, over open terraces or closed “living rooms” depending on the need to be in the “room” or in the “street”.