The new city district Jätkäsaari, meaning ‘Dockers’ Island’, has been planned with a focus on sustainable and community-based solutions. The residential buildings share backyards and parking spaces. The area will also be equipped with an innovative waste collection system. Waste is transported via an underground pipeline to a waste collection station, from where it is transported onwards to be utilised as recycled material, incinerated for energy or converted into biogas.

The new building is designed as a two-segment residential block with eight floors. The street facade comprises unplastered, white, retro-patterned bricks with white mortar joints. The window openings have a reticent expression; the strength of the facade coming from its solid brickwork. The upper floors are pulled back from the street, while the yard side of the building expresses itself with a dramatic change in colour and material. This facade is constructed with glazed wood and the apartments have long, glazed balconies, which improve the building’s energy efficiency. The facade’s highlight in terms of the city landscape is the terrace on the 7th floor which opens out from the building’s communal room. The ground floor consists of restaurants and business premises with access from the street.

The property’s apartments are each tailormade in accordance with the future resident’s wishes. This process has been facilitated by the close cooperation of many stakeholders. This has required a lot of creative thinking, to find optimal solutions, since it wasn’t always possible to fulfil all requests, due to legislative, technical or financial reasons.

Once completed in 2030, the new city district will provide 21,000 homes and workplaces for 6,000 people.