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Department European and Nordic Faculty Institution – Department Faculty of Social Sciences European and Nordic Studies Author Pierce Patrick Cosgrove Title Meanings, Messages, and Histories: An Assessment of Helsinki’s Relationship with Classical Architecture Subject Architectural History, Finnish History, Finnish Architecture, History of Helsinki, Architecture of Helsinki, Classical Architecture Level Month and year Number of pages Master’s Thesis October 2020 105 Abstract This thesis aims to examine and contextualize the histories, meanings, and the messages behind a number of the most significant classical structures in Helsinki, looking in particular at who erected these buildings and why they did so, along with what the planners and architects were trying to emphasize through their architectural design choices. The legacies of these builders and their buildings are also to be analysed. Specifically, this thesis does not aim to answer why Finland has classical architecture, but rather what it means for this young nation to have it, especially so in such significant abundance and considering that a great many of the nation’s most important buildings have been designed in this particular style. Keywords Classical Architecture, History, Helsinki, Classicism, Nationalism, Romanticism, Imperialism, Western Identity, Finnish Architecture Where deposited University of Helsinki Library Additional information Meanings, Messages, and Histories: An Assessment of Helsinki’s Relationship with Classical Architecture Pierce Patrick Cosgrove University of Helsinki Faculty of Social Sciences European and Nordic Studies Master’s Thesis October 13th 2020 Table of Contents Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 1 Research Questions ............................................................................................................................ 3 Structure of this thesis ....................................................................................................................... 4 Data and Methods .............................................................................................................................. 6 Previous Research .............................................................................................................................. 6 Labelled Map of Helsinki .................................................................................................................... 7 Chapter 1: The Ancient Origins of Classical Architecture ..................................................................... 9 1.1: A Natural Evolution ..................................................................................................................... 9 1.2: The Greeks ................................................................................................................................. 10 1.3: The Romans ............................................................................................................................... 11 1.4: After Rome ................................................................................................................................ 13 Chapter 2: Sveaborg – The Gibraltar of the North .............................................................................. 15 2.1: Backdrop – Approaching mid-18th century Sweden ................................................................. 16 2.2: Conceptions and Intentions ...................................................................................................... 17 2.3: Neoclassicism within the walls of Sveaborg ............................................................................ 19 2.4: Russian Renovations ................................................................................................................. 27 Chapter 3: The Senate Square – The Imperial Heart of Helsinki ........................................................ 32 3.1: The Grand Duchy of Finland, Ehrenström, and the new Capital City ...................................... 32 3.2: Carl Ludwig Engel and the Empire Style ................................................................................... 36 3.3: The Senate Square Proper: The Missing Piece ......................................................................... 38 3.4: The Senate Square Proper: The Senate Building, the University, and the Cathedral ............. 42 Chapter 4: The Old Student House, Ateneum, and the National Romantic Movement ................... 52 4.1: Finland’s Mid-19th Century National Romanticism Developments ......................................... 52 4.2: The Old Student House: Architectural Meanings and Messages ............................................ 53 4.3: Ateneum: Architectural Meanings and Messages ................................................................... 60 Chapter 5: The National Archives and the House of the Estates ........................................................ 69 5.1: Gustaf Nyström – the Architect ................................................................................................ 69 5.2: The Conceptual Histories Behind these Buildings .................................................................... 71 5.3: The Finnish National Archives: Architectural Meanings and Messages .................................. 75 5.4: The House of the Estates: Architectural Meanings and Messages .......................................... 82 Chapter 6: The Parliament House – Finland’s New Political Centre ................................................... 88 6.1: The Turn of the Century’s Architectural and Political Developments in Finland .................... 88 6.2: The Conception of the Parliament House ................................................................................ 92 6.3: Parliament House – Architectural Meanings and Messages ................................................... 94 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 98 Bibliography........................................................................................................................................ 100 Image Citations ............................................................................................................................... 103 Introduction “You can’t imagine how beautiful Helsinki will be, and how beautiful it is now.”1 - Carl Ludwig Engel, 1831 Nine years after saying this, the Berlin-born Prussian architect Carl Ludwig Engel died, only sixty-two years into his life, and another twelve years before the completion of the Helsinki Cathedral, the epicentre of his life’s masterpiece project – the Helsinki Senate Square. By 1831 Helsinki Cathedral was only a year under its construction, and had Engel lived past 1840 to see further development of the city he so profoundly shaped and influenced, it is likely that he would be quite pleased with his former words from so long ago in addition to the many design decisions he made, given that Helsinki is widely acknowledged today to be a very beautiful city indeed. The Senate Square is one of, if not the most tourist-visited and recognizable area(s) from throughout the entirety of the city still today, for few neighbourhoods of Helsinki can match its magnitude, history, or stylistic impressiveness. In addition to all of this though, it also remains both the city’s and the nation’s most powerful and prevalent statement of classical architecture. Classical architecture is not just one of Helsinki’s most prominent architectural styles – it is one of Finland’s most recognizable appearances overall, and the same is true throughout both the other Nordic and Baltic countries, as well as for much of Europe in general – especially so for Northern Europe. Cities like London, Paris, Berlin, Copenhagen, and St. Petersburg too are rich with classical revivalism ornately decorating their most integral and revered city spaces. Throughout Finland, Engel played a direct part in that spread, as his designs were realised not only in Helsinki, but also in the former capital of Turku, and even further west in the now-autonomous islands of Åland. Engel’s employment for the Russian Empire also had him working in Estonia and Russia proper, and thus we can accept that the entirety of the north-eastern Baltic Sea area has been quite literally shaped by his design influence, and that the appearances of these nations, at least in some regards, are reflections of this architect’s ideals and those of the period he lived in. He was not the first to bring classicism to Finland, although he was the most influential. What naturally develops from such discussion is the particular question of ‘why.’ Why, exactly, is there so much of this style across Europe – and especially across Northern Europe at that? What about this appearance in particular made it so coveted those centuries and even mere decades ago, with its origins laying deeply beneath further centuries of time and in rather distance places? 1Klinge, Matti and Laura Kolbe. Trans. Malcolm Hicks. Helsinki, Daughter of the Baltic: A Short Biography. 1st pr. of the rev. ed. Helsinki: Otava, 2007. 27. 1 Are its reasons for being here numerous, or are they simply more symbolic and microcosmic for a larger (and now antiquated) statement about the transferral of power from the ancient, decadent south of Europe to its modern,
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