Test erection for the World Design Capital meeting point

The functioning of the pavilion that will be built in spring 2012 on a plot of land between the Design Museum and the Museum of Finnish Architecture has been tested by means of a test erection.

In summer 2012, the pavilion will be our place for meeting the public, the media and visiting international experts, and a diverse programme will be organised there – workshops, top-class international and Finnish speech talks, dances, film shows, design flea-markets and picnics. The pavilion will also house a café and the small World Design Capital Helsinki 2012 shop.

The test erection of the pavilion took place between 16 and 18 August 2011. The sections of the construction were made and pre-assembled in Otaniemi in a workshop at Aalto University Department of Architecture, and were transported to the plot between the museums on a truck equipped with a crane, which also assisted in its erection. Eight people participated in the erection and it took several hours.

”What was noticeable in the model of the pavilion that we then built was that it was not like a part of the final pavilion. The test model was also made of battens, whereas in the final pavilion, both the beams and columns will be solid. The purpose of the model was chiefly to study the scale and the effect created by the beams and columns. We also studied the semi-curtain walls descending from the beams,” says Pyry-Pekka Kantonen, whose plan ‘Museopolku’ (museum path) was chosen in May for further development from a selection of 10 plan proposals by Aalto University students.

The group working on the further development consists of students from the Aalto University Department of Architecture, the School of Art and Design woodwork studios and the Department of Design. The Pavilion is being created as a result of extensive co-operation between several different organisations, namelythe World Design Capital organisation, Aalto University, the Design Museum, the Museum of Finnish Architecture and UPM.

”It was good to do the test according to the correct scale. It proved that the pavilion’s dimensions work and look good. The structure also worked very well, although in the test model we used many smaller structural reinforcements than we will in the final pavilion,” says Kantonen.

Architect Simon Bearnes who teaches at the AA School in London will come to supervise the realisation and finishing of the concept. The pavilion will open after May Day 2012.

The World Design Capital also has meeting places in other cities. The Vantaa WDC Helsinki 2012 place is located on Asematie in Tikkurila. In Espoo, WDC can be encountered at a location opening at WeeGee. Muotohuoltamo in Lahti is operating in an old service station building on Vesijärvenkatu.