The future of a country grown out of forests is built of wood

Wood is not only Finland's traditional construction material, but impressive contemporary architecture is also created out of wood. The Finnish know-how in wood construction has great international potential. Promoting wood construction is one of the key measures in achieving Finland's ambitious goal of carbon neutrality by 2035. We compiled a selection of interesting contemporary wood architecture examples accompanied by contextualising articles.

In today's Finland, the built environment consumes half of all raw materials and 40 per cent of energy and causes one-third of carbon dioxide emissions. The reduction of the carbon footprint of housing and construction is incorporated in Prime Minister Sanna Marin's government programme. Finland's new architectural policy programme, Towards Sustainable Architecture, presents actions through which architecture, construction and land use can have an impact on finding solutions to climate challenges.

Commissioned by the Ministry of the Environment, we have produced an information package on wood architecture. The package includes presentations of 17 design projects of different scales, as well as articles on the history, present and future of Finnish wood construction. Architect and journalist Tarja Nurmi has written the project descriptions and one of the articles, whereas the authors of the other articles are PhD Laura Berger and architect–writer Netta Böök, who are both experts in the history of wood construction, and our Head of Communications, architect Miina Jutila.

A link to the information package will shortly be published here. The cases will also be included in our web service Finnish Architecture Navigator.