There are a spate of proposed skyscrapers proposed in the Helsinki area at the moment. The most notable of a mostly bland bunch is the still ongoing planning of the Pasila area and now a 33 storey hotel in Jätkäsaari. This hotel design by Davidsson Tarkela is financed by Arthur Buchardt the Norwegian investor who was behind the failed hotel in the South Harbour by Herzog & DeMeuron. It’s clear in a development as big as the harbor regeneration in Helsinki there will be at least one big hotel, but I’m really not convinced about this design. Buchardt is behind the new Victoria Hotel in Stockholm by Gert Wingårdh Architects. Notice any similarities?

I’m not against building high but developers and planners need to think long and hard about doing it. This type of approach is much more valid  in the Victoria Hotel location which is beside the main road somewhere between the airport and the center of town, but the central location in Jätkäsaari makes it a different proposition altogether . Any hotel at Jätkäsaari has some great context and the addition of  a stream of interesting ideas being fed into the harbor development.

Buchardt and the city planners should give the opportunity for their Architects to help shape the project much more or open it up to a competition. (via)