Heat pump building in Helsinki: less is more

Finnish architects Virkkunen & Co have realized a heat pump building made of brick in Helsinki, which is an important part of the transition to carbon-neutral energy production. Read more about the architecture of the heat pump building here.

The location and the task were not new to the Finnish architectural firm Virkkunen & Co Architects. The architects had already designed two architectural landmarks in the east of Helsinki, near the port of Vuosaari and the Baltic Sea, in the past. Vuosaari Power Plant A, built in 1987, and Vuosaari Power Plant B, built in 1998, have a decisive influence on the character of the industrial landscape today. Virkkunen & Co Architects thus created the context for their new design task of a heat pump building themselves, so to speak. In the immediate vicinity of the existing power plants, the client – the Finnish energy company Helen Ltd – wanted the new power plant as part of its sustainability strategy. The company is striving to achieve carbon-neutral energy production by 2030. The new Vuosaari heat pump building will use excess process heat from power plants A and B in winter and seawater heat in summer to generate district heating.

Virkkunen & Co Architects based the design on the surrounding industrial landscape and created a minimalist box that blends seamlessly into the context of the surroundings. The building has two floors. The first floor consists of a double-height room that houses the main process equipment. The electrical and control rooms are also located on the same level. The machine room is located on the second floor. This level is connected to the roof via an external staircase.

Overall, the building consists of a frame and a shell made of prefabricated concrete elements. These were manufactured off-site and then easily assembled on site as prefabricated parts. Inside, the exposed concrete surfaces dominate the atmosphere. On the outside, the long sides of the box are clad in mottled red brick. This opens up an exciting view from the adjacent parking lot and the road to the south, as well as from the Vuosaari B power station. This is because the façade is not designed entirely in a rigid stacked bond grid, but is supplemented by wing-shaped bricks specially made for the project in the upper section of the longitudinal walls. The stacked bond corresponds with the red brick cladding of the neighboring Vuosaari B power plant. The wing-shaped bricks break up this austerity. The façades of the new heat pump power plant thrive on this contrast between the lively but subtle color and shape variations of the individual bricks and their well thought-out arrangement.

The unusually designed east façade stands alongside the brick walls. This faces the main entrance to the entire power plant site and thus takes on a representative role. It has a double-skin design, with the inner layer consisting of a glass façade clad with tall, thin tubes made of white-painted steel. In addition to the aesthetic component, the design also serves to protect the interior from excessive heat and glare from the sun. Thanks to the arrangement in front of the glass façade, it is still possible to see inside. This allows interested visitors to experience the internal work processes.

The west façade is also designed to contrast with the longitudinal façades. It also has a double-skin structure. The theme of accessibility is staged here in an unusual way. A straight steel staircase is suspended between the outer screen of metal rods and an inner layer of in-situ concrete. The rods are arranged diagonally at the same angle as the trapezoidal bricks on the long sides of the building. This trick means that all four sides of the building have recurring elements. The metal rods and the play with the diagonal alignment thus serve as motifs that subtly build up references.

The architecture of the heat pump building is reduced on the one hand, but finely differentiated in terms of details and materials. For example, the façade treatments and details follow the logic of the floor divisions and room heights of the interior spaces. The interiors of the building thus not only communicate with the exterior, but also bring the industrial building to a human scale.

The Vuosaari heat pump building not only serves as a flagship for the Finnish energy company Helen Ltd, but was also awarded the Architecture MasterPrize in the “Industrial Building” category in 2022. The award recognizes the “seamless integration into the surrounding industrial landscape, the sustainable energy approach and the thoughtful combination of materials and finishes.” With the Vuosaari heat pump building, Virkkunen & Co Architects has undoubtedly made an outstanding contribution to timeless industrial architecture that focuses on ingenious details and appropriateness rather than grand gestures.

Even more bricks: In B12/23, we present projects that have recently been built with bricks. Find out more about the magazine in the editorial.

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