report Planned cities Tt 50 B 4 03 BUilt to 01 01 Students sitting outside PLAN Aalto University in Otaniemi, Espoo Global 02 Mayor of Espoo, Jukka The garden city Mäkelä Preface 03 Outdoor swimming Tapiola, Finland It isn’t as easy as pool in Tapiola governments suppose Year1 founded:2 1951 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 to build a metropolis Founded by: Heikki von Hertzen, a lawyer from scratch with Name: Means “the home of Tapio”, all the vibrancy of a the forest god in Finland’s 19th-century city that has grown national epic The Kalevala naturally. So here are Population: 9,325 a few examples of Iconic building: Aarne Ervi’s Mäntytorni cities from different apartment building, built in 1954 periods of history that were built according 02 “Our success is down to collaboration to a spcific plan and between the city, its residents, the univer- have stood the sity and businesses,” says Jukka Mäkelä, test of time. the mayor of Espoo, Finland’s second- largest city. He is standing among the birch trees outside his childhood home. As he expounds his vision for the city’s future, one of the children playing out- side hits a ball under his electric car. Wel- come to Tapiola garden city. Located in the east of Espoo munici- pality, the district of Tapiola was con- ceived by a lawyer, Heikki von Hertzen, whose book Homes or Barracks for Our Children? set out his urban-planning priorities: nature, family, jobs, public space and a variety of housing options. In 1951, Von Hertzen founded the private, non-profit Housing Foundation with funding from trade unions and social organisations, purchased 270 hectares PHOTOGRAPHER: JUHO KUVA of forest west of Helsinki and recruited 03 issue 85 — 145 report Planned cities Nordstadt Schlossgarten Tt 50 Karlsruhe Oststadt Karlsruhe Zoo 01 Tierpark Oberwald Finland’s leading architects, including Alvar Aalto, Aarne Ervi and Kaija Siren, to help make his vision a reality. That vision was of a self-contained but diverse community. The area was divided into four neighbourhood units, each surrounded by a green belt. Eighty 02 03 08 per cent of the dwellings were social hous- ing and white modernist blocks were set among pine and birch trees. In the centre, Aarne Ervi converted a former gravel pit into a large, square water basin. Over- looking it is Arto Sipinen’s 1989 multi- storey cultural centre as well as a sleek church, public swimming pool, outdoor 09 amphitheatre and shopping centre. 01 Inside Arto Sipinen’s Since the 1950s, Tapiola has con- 1989 cultural centre 02 Taking a break in the tinued to evolve. A case in point is the centre of Tapiola WeeGee house, designed in the 1960s 03 Apartment buildings by Aarno Ruusuvuori as a printworks 04 Inside the Startup Sauna for publisher Weilin+Göös. Today, the 05 Plate Culture’s Reda Štaré with a colleague protected building is home to the largest 04 05 exhibition centre in Finland. Businesses 06 Old office of forestry have evolved, too. Metsäliitto forestry company Metsä 07 Playtime co-operative moved to Tapiola in 1975 08 Tapiola’s swimming and in 2007 constructed the country’s pool and sports centre largest wooden office building. Recently 00 Susanna Siira, Metsä’s the business, now called Metsä Group, marketing manager brought all five of its subsidiary compa- 10 Impressive canteen at nies together, renovated a 1970s building Metsä and installed an impressive staff canteen with an undulating wooden roof. At the other end of the spectrum is Startup Sauna, housed nearby on the Otaniemi campus of Aalto University (for- merly Helsinki University of Technology). PHOTOGRAPHER: JUHO KUVA 06 07 10 146 — issue 85 issue 85 — 147 report Planned cities 01 Outdoor amphitheatre 02 Sokos Tapiola Garden One resident, Reda Štaré, the Lithuanian co-founder of social-dining start-up Plate Culture, praises the harmony of Tapiola’s landscaping and the university’s low-rise 1960s buildings designed by Alvar Aalto. “Otaniemi is a great place to think and work,” she says. Startup Sauna is exactly the kind of initiative beloved by the mayor, who studied at the university before it was Tt 50 renamed and sees it as an incubator of inno- vation. Mäkelä hopes to unite Tapiola and Otaniemi with the waterfront district of Keilaniemi in what he calls the Espoo Innovation Garden. Part of the plan is a €1bn metro line to improve travel between Espoo and Helsinki. Tapiola’s immediate future also includes mass underground parking, a renovated bus station, new business and residential and retail space. The role of the city of Espoo has been controversial since it began manag- ing Tapiola’s infrastructure in the 1980s. Architecture purists have criticised devel- opments as inconsistent with garden-city ideals. But Mäkelä disagrees, arguing that taller buildings are necessary to avoid encroaching on the green belts and retain Tapiola’s proximity to nature. Innovation and transport are his way of restoring the area’s appeal to young families and his lesson for any urban planner is refresh- ingly simple: “Build for children and their parents and, above all, listen to your residents.” — tj 148 — issue 85 issue 85 — 149 report Planned4 cities03 Waipu The revitalised city Taichung, Taiwan Wuqi 1 4 6 Year2 founded: 17053 5 7 8 9 10 Founded by: Qing dynasty military from Taichung mainland China Dadu City Name: Taichung means “central Taiwan”, Tt 50 renamed by the Japanese in 1895 Hemei Population: 2.7 million Iconic building: Taichung Metropolitan Opera House, built by Toyo Ito in 2014 When the incessant rains finally let up 01 08 for a couple of hours during Taiwan’s wet More planned cities season, residents of Taichung head to the leafy strip of parkland known as the 1 Lavasa, India Located near the Calligraphy Greenway. Young couples Pune-Mumbai corri- meander beneath the canopy of trees, dor, a major industrial dogs bouncing on leashes; old men march region, Lavasa is a energetically along paths lined with rock 07 private city built in sculptures; others sit reading novels bor- the style of an Italian They laid out streets in a chessboard for- coastal village. rowed from a nearby book depository. 2 Putrajaya, Malaysia mation, intersecting them with narrow “It’s really beautiful in the morning,” The Malaysia seat of lanes. Grand, western-style buildings says Junji Sakai, a Japanese expat who government shifted such as the railway station and city hall, opened the first overseas outpost of his from Kuala Lumpur to both still in use today, were constructed Tokyo-based doughnut shop Haritts in a Putrajaya, a planned downtown, along with a series of parks garden city, in 1999. narrow lane off the Greenway two years 02 03 that enclose the city centre like a “jade 01 Mojo Coffee barista 3 Milton Keynes, UK ago. “Every day I walk through the park 02 Bookstore for Beginners Designated in 1967, necklace”, as Wang Chun-chieh, director from my apartment to my shop. It gives 03 Bikes for rent Milton Keynes has general of Taichung’s Urban Develop- me a lot of energy.” 04 Planner at the Urban become one of the ment Bureau, puts it. Sakai was drawn to Taichung rather Development Bureau most successful In recent decades, Taichung has examples of a post- than Taiwan’s hectic capital, Taipei, due 05 Taichung Metropolitan spread outward as the city became one Opera House war new town. to the city’s slower pace and better quality of the world’s leading manufacturers of 06 Park Lane by CMP 09 of life. Part of Taichung’s charm derives department store bicycles and shoes (the bike company from its compact size and excellent park 07 Miyahara store Giant has its headquarters here, as does system, which has remained largely intact 08 Morning meditation at Pou Chen Group, which makes shoes since the city’s development under its Taichung Park for Nike and Adidas among others). But 09 Courtyard of the old Japanese rulers in the early 20th century. city hall the inner city has remained a vital part The Japanese modernised Taichung, 10 Taking a stroll along of the local economy due to Taichung’s modelling it on Kyoto’s urban plan. Calligraphy Greenway continued reliance on the railway and the thousands of small businesses that have sprouted up in the dense warren of lanes, from bubble-tea shops and orchid sellers to the trendy cafés and boutiques that have arrived more recently. With manufacturing shifting over- seas, the Taichung government and pri- vate developers are now focusing on revitalising the city centre to bring life back to heritage buildings and attract creative enterprise to the city. The refur- bishment of the Calligraphy Greenway, for instance, has coincided with the trans- PHOTOGRAPHER: LI-HAN LIN formation of Taichung’s western district. 04 05 06 10 150 — issue 85 issue 85 — 151 report 01 Hotel One Planned cities 02 Hong Kong tourists visiting the Greenway 03 Doughnuts at Haritts 04 Cabbage restaurant 05 View of Civic Park and Calligraphy Greenway 06 Scott Chen, owner of Mojo Coffee Rather than tear down old buildings and 07 Huskies on Calligraphy widen lanes, developers have sought to Greenway retain the fabric of the community and 08 Taichung’s newest park, Maple Garden 07 recruit independent businesses rather 09 Hanging out at than major retailers. Calligraphy Greenway The small developer Fantasy Story 10 Old city hall has led the way. Founded by two univer- sity classmates in 2010, the company has 03 renovated two dozen properties and rents Tt 50 4 space to more than 60 businesses, from umbrella-makers to industrial designers.