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Suursaari
Island – in the original images of Temppeliaukio
Church
Text: Maila Mehtälä (March 2010)
Photos: J.W. and Jorma Mattila
Timo and Tuomo Suomalainen were born on the
rugged island of Suursaari, in the middle of the Gulf of
Finland. Of the three mountains whose silhouettes
dominate the island, two rise to the height of 160
metres. The island is about 11 kilometres long and only
1.5 to 3 kilometres wide. Their childhood island
environment – the wild nature and the dialogue
between nature and the densely built village –
unconsciously influenced the brothers’ work,
especially the architecture of Temppeliaukio Church. A
few photographs with captions give a glimpse of the
attraction of this island, which was lost in war.
Suurkylä village, on the eastern shore of
Suursaari Island.
Timo (1928-) and Tuomo (1931-88) Suomalainen were born in
the village of Suurkylä, ”Great Village”. The
village spread over the slowly rising terrain, which rose
from Satamalahti, harbor bay, as a dense cluster made up
of about a hundred dwellings and many outbuildings. In
contrast to the glacial rock and gentle eastern shore,
the western shore seen from the sea is dominated by the
mountains of Pohjoiskorkia, Haukkavuori, and
Lounatkorkia. Between the mountains there are valleys,
woods, lakes, marshland, and small meadows, but no areas
suitable for farming. The residents, only some 800, had
to squeeze their livelihood from the sea washing the
rocks. It required throwing oneself into disciplined
co-operation with untamed and occasionally dangerous
nature. The families of the brothers on both their
father’s and mother’s sides were ship pilots
from the island. It is easy to believe that people that
settled in this kind of place were persistent,
independent, and perhaps sensitive to the impressiveness
of the island.
Satamalahti bay seen from the white sandy beach
of Liivanranta.
Satamalahti, “Harbour Bay”, with its shore
barns, docks, fishing boats, yawls, and visiting barks,
was the centre of life for the Suurkylä people. The
regularly operating passenger ships also docked at the
breakwater. During the years before the Second World War
up to 9000 visitors arrived on the island during the
summer season. Most of the summer guests stayed at island
homes. The Suomalainen family, too, housed visitors,
necessitating the family itself to live in barns and in
the sauna building during the summer season. The shores
of Satamalahti served as a place to maintain the vessels,
clean fish, wash laundry, exchange news, and generally
set the matters of the world in order. Satamalahti bay,
with its rambling shore structures and clear water, was
an enchanting playground for village children. The
harbour was like a playground and waterpark built on a
scale suitable for children, always offering something
new according to the season. The lagoon-like bay,
somewhat oval in shape, protected from the restless sea
by a breakwater built from large blocks of granite, was
one of the most powerful spatial experiences for the
architect brothers during their childhood days.
The old mail path – the most central and
perhaps oldest village feature.
‘Mail path’ in Suurkylä Village was like a
series of dusky tunnels made from the old houses and
barns and foliage of trees, with the small clearings at
road crossings giving light at each end of the tunnels.
The picturesque villages of Suursaari Island with their
lanes, views over the shores and inland lakes, mountains
and rocky outcrops had inspired artists since the 19th
century. The people in the home village knew as well how
to appreciate the nature and beauty of their living
environment. The respect for environment and place is
visible in the brothers’ architecture. According to
Timo Suomalainen they, however, never tried to imitate
nature in their work, but instead intuitively chose the
structures, shapes, materials, and colours so that they
would generate a sense of nature at its best. In the fall
of 1939, during the first days of the Winter War, both
villages of the island, Suurkylä and Kiiskinkylä, were
destroyed in the bombings by the Soviet Union. The
residents of the island managed to be evacuated to the
town of Loviisa on the mainland. Timo was then 11 years
old and Tuomo almost eight. According to conditions of
the Moscow Peace Treaty Suursaari Island had to be ceded
to the Soviet Union in 1944.
The Stone ledge and a summer guest at the foot of
Haukkavuori Mountain.
In many locations on the western side of Suursaari
Island, the stone walls of the mountains rise
dramatically towards the sky. Mountains, rock clefts,
stone ledges, caves, boulders, “giant’s
cauldrons”, and seashore rocks were enticing with
their magnificence, mysticism, silence, and sense of
holiness. The island was an intact unity, a space defined
by contrasts, where freedom and security worked
simultaneously – an experience that the brothers in
their architectural solutions such as for Temppeliaukio
Church tried to reach. Timo Suomalainen tells how the
acquaintances of childhood, the boulders and rocks,
gained a special place in their work. When their journey
as refugees ended, Timo at 19 and Tuomo at 15 got a
chance with their own hands to drill and even explode
stone when building a new home on a plot in the town of
Hamina (then Vehkalahti) given to the refuge family. In
the beginning of their career as architects, the brothers
became familiar with rock construction when designing
projects for the Finnish Defence Forces. Stone and rock
became the expression of power and stability not only in
Temppeliaukio Church (1960–69) but also in
Espoonlahti Church (1976–80), and in the Hotel
Mesikämmen, built in Ähtäri (1973–76).
The weather clears - sails are being dried.
In the course of human history, rather than restricting
freedom or creativity, the sea has instead offered the
possibility to escape narrow-mindedness. The mobility of
the people of Suursaari Island was manifested in family
relationships encompassing the outer islands and the
coast of the Gulf of Finland. Visiting artists and
numerous tourist groups ensured cultural exchange, which
extended abroad. Sailors went to the sea and brought
influences even from remote lands. The geology and
unusual plant life interested researchers of culture.
Suursaari Island is immortalised in pictures and printed
media. It has been engrained deep in the minds of those
who visited there or were born there. The childhood
environment offered Timo and Tuomo Suomalainen a basis to
create architecture as a union of functionality and
practicality and emotion. As a result were born
functional buildings expressing free forms, a strong
sense of materials, and active interplay of structures.
One way of describing their work is "critical
pragmatism", the words used when Timo Suomalainen
was invited to become a honorary member of SAFA, the
Finnish Association of Architects in December 2009.
Of original images and universal feelings.
Even occupied by a foreign power, Suursaari Island has
managed to stay in the limelight of interest surprisingly
actively. Temppeliaukio Church, which inherited a lot
from the impressive island, continuously attracts
visitors from all around the world. The more than a half
a million visitors annually make it the most popular
architectural sight in Finland1. Art historian Timo Koho
says in his book Menneisyyden muistikuvat (Atena, 2003
– "Images of the Past") that, in spite of
its modernity, Temppeliaukio Church carries interesting
images of the past. According to Koho, the great
international interest in the church stems from the
sense, in its sacral space one can feel both nature
mysticism and the universal feeling of the early stages
of Christianity. Timo Suomalainen admits it. He says that
their courage and right to break into the rock was
consciously rooted both the early Christians’ need
to seek shelter as well as the protective qualities of
Finland’s medieval churches. Nevertheless, part of
the creative process was rooted also in the unconscious
stream, which functioned as an invisible tool quite apart
from practical considerations. Those entering the church
space can let themselves be taken by the same stream,
experiencing the emotions of their culture and feelings,
opening up to personal meanings, and restoring themselves
in a sheltered environment.
In Temppeliaukio, one can easily find Suursaari Island as
one of the many original images, and one of the most
impressive. According to Timo Suomalainen, this unity of
worlds of form and experience the brothers themselves,
however, realised only after the construction work of the
church was finished.
Translated from the Finnish original by Pirkko-Liisa
Louhenjoki-Schulman.
Sources
Interview with Timo Suomalainen
(Espoo, March 2010).
Mehtälä Maila: Temppeliaukio – kirkko Suursaaresta
länteen. WSOY 2003.
Note1
Finnish Tourist Board: number of visitors in 2007 (the
most recent statistics for the whole country)
Santasalo Ky: number of visitors for each sight in 2009
(statistics for Helsinki)
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