Dance House Helsinki -exhibition

Aalto University Architecture Department, exhibition of the student work

Turbiinisali, Kaapelitehdas, Tallberginkatu 1, 00180 Helsinki

2. -17.6.2016, mon-fri 10 am – 5 pm

The project is based on a real initiative and need for performance spaces for a leading dance education centre and theatre in Finland. The Dance House Helsinki building will be exceptional even by international standards, and it will include a unique design and spatial arrangement embracing a wide variety of different genres of dance culture. The Dance House will be an accessible and welcoming gathering place for the public while providing amenities for high quality performances of other art forms. The course was developed together with Dance House Helsinki association and Helsinki City Planning Department.

The objective of the course was to study alternatives how the building could be situated beside the Kaapelitehdas cultural centre, which operates in a former cable factory facility. The building should raise curiosity and reflect the identity of the Dance House Helsinki among the visitors. Strong emphasis is put on the innovativeness and architectural quality of the building as well as the adaptation of the building to the surrounding environment. Through designing the building, it is possible to explore the possibilities how the Dance House could generate wellbeing infrastructure to the city. Encouraging active lifestyles in the building is one way of keeping people healthy and taking care of themselves.

The main aim of the studio is to teach how to design an architecturally advanced large public building. The specialty of this studio is to study dance performing and educational spaces, flexibility of the building and a relationship of a public building to the existing urban city space. Each student made an individual design project for the course. There were 17 students on the course. The exhibition presents studies of the building from nine architecture student. They were given free hands how to situate the building in connection with Kaapelitehdas building. The total floor area designated for the Dance House building is 7,000 square meters, of which around 1,400 square meters would be devoted to performing dance halls.

The course is a co-operation project with Tsinghua University, Beijing China. There was a workshop week with Tsinghua design studio in Finland and a final review in the end of the course was held together with Tsinghua studio in Beijing.

Students in the exhibition                                    Teachers

Ilkka Ala-Fossi                                                       Pirjo Sanaksenaho, associate professor 

Iiris Andersson                                                      Teemu Kurkela, adjunct professor

Markus Böck                                                         Sari Lehtonen, university teacher

Tuuli Kanerva                                                         Fernando Nieto, postdoc researcher

Mariana Lazaro Rantanen                                     Ville Hara, architect 

Pia Pokkinen                                                         Toni Kotnik, Professor (Structures)

Sarita Poptani                                                        Erkki Immonen, Sc. Eng. (HVAC)

Liuxin Yang                                                            Claudia Auer, architect

Matti Wäre

                                                                            Partners

                                                                            Helsinki City Planning Department,

                                                                            Jari Huhtaniemi

                                                                            Dance House association, Tuomo Hahl

More information:

Aalto University, Sari Lehtonen, , sari.lehtonen@aalto.fi, tel. 050 593 9009

Kiinteistö Oy Kaapelitalo, Kai Huotari, kai.huotari@kaapeli.fi, tel. 050 3841557

Tanssin talo ry, Hanna-Mari Peltomäki, hanna-mari.peltomaki@tanssintalo.fi, tel. 044 5131069