Renovation and alteration

Kitisenranta School is located in the centre of Sodankylä on the shore of the river Kitinen. The building has served as the home for a variety of extracurricular activities already during its school use and increasingly as the active school use ended in 2007. Since the beginning of the festival the school has served as the headquarters of the Midnight Sun Film Festival, a significant cultural event in Sodankylä that has been running since 1986.

Together with a team of engineers we drew up a project plan for the transformation of the old, designed by Yrjö Lindegren, completed in 1951, into a cultural and community centre. The building was designed to have a state-of-the-art event space along with functional service areas and solutions tailored to the needs of performers and technology. Most of the recreational facilities were designed to have a base level that allows their use to vary depending on the changing needs of the associations and organisations using them.

The requirements for the new use are designed to be implemented while preserving the architectural values of the building. Repair classification diagrams for spaces and façades helped determine which areas allow for more changes and where stricter measures should be taken to restore the original appearance. The implementation of HVAC systems in a way that suits the value and phenotype of the building was taken into account already during the project planning phase, and the project included the HVAC project plan sections prepared with HVAC and electrical designers.

project plan 2015–2016
principal and architectural design Mustonen Architects Ltd.
contractee Sodankylä municipality