|
Building Information's website gives you
more information about our products,
services and news.
Take a tour to get acquainted with our
products and the history of the second
oldest building centre in the world. The address of the English version is
http://www.rakennustieto.fi/index/english.html
Wooden Urban Villages – Examples of Modern Wooden Towns
Fresh light on modern wooden town construction. This book tells the success story of Finnish wood construction and throws new light on the direction of housing construction in Finland today, where more than a decade of development and construction of modern wooden towns and compact, low-rise housing has created a wealth of knowledge and a diverse variety of pioneering and resident-oriented wooden residential milieux. For many Finns, human-scale, independent and close-to-nature living has become the modern day dream. Residential environments that are urbanly compact, yet low-rise have been explored as a solution to the need for complementary building that supports both sustainable development of Finland’s growth centres and diversification of its housing supply. Communal, low-rise residential milieux, or urban villages, are being looked to as an answer to this growing demand. Modern wooden town construction is investigated from three key perspectives: past and present studies, experiences and newly completed building projects. The book’s expert commentary and presentations of completed wooden housing areas showcase the best of Finnish expertise in wood construction and highlight the myriad possibilities of building in wood. English and Finnish texts. Wooden Urban Villages – Examples of Modern Wooden Towns
Markku Karjalainen and Riku Patokoski
Publishing company: Rakennustieto Publishing
Publisher: Puuinfo Oy
ISBN: 978-951-682-844-5
168 pp.
34 euros, VAT incl. Books are available from the publisher Rakennustieto Publishing, our online shop, Building Centre bookshopsand other bookshops around the world. Link to the online bookshop presenting the book |
 |
Finnish Sauna - Design and Construction
| A reference book for those building their own sauna What factors should be considered in the design of a good Finnish sauna? Finnish Sauna – Design and Construction contains information and instructions for the design of a good Finnish sauna, with sections on sauna rooms, components, seating platforms and furnishings, and the planning of the related heating, ventilation and electrical installations, as well as the properties of sauna stoves and their selection. The information contained in Finnish Sauna – Design and Construction has been collected from the Building Information Files for architects and builders and represents the best know-how available in Finland. All the facts and principles are based on a long tradition of practical knowledge over generations and which in recent times has been continuously updated through the committee work of top professionals. Finnish Sauna – Design and Construction also contains a chapter concerning the historical development of the sauna, as well as a chapter presenting instructions for building a traditional smoke sauna. There are also three examples of contemporary Finnish saunas introduced at the end of the book. The planning and design of a sauna proceed from the specific requirements of the users. This book provides the basis for a successful sauna project. Finnish Sauna – Design and Construction
6th, revised edition
Publishing company: Rakennustieto
Publishing ISBN: 978-951-682-856-8
117 pp.
26 euros, VAT incl. Books are available from the publisher, online shopand Building Centre bookshops. |
 |
Office Buildings in Finland
This book presents 14 Finnish office buildings from the present century. The nature of the book is markedly “professional”. In a way it is a handbook of office building design in which the buildings are presented on several pages with their floor plans and technical details giving the reader a thorough idea of each building and the planning background, as well as learning how to design the Finnish way. The selection of projects in the book has been made by Reijo Jallinoja, professor of architecture. The project presentations are complemented by architect Panu Lehtovuori’s article “The Office Building as a site for urban innovation”. The book aspires to create a wide perspective on the various trends in current Finnish office architecture. If the contents of the book had to be summed up in a few words, it would be “humane high-technology”. Office Buildings in Finland offers fresh ideas for architects and students within the building profession, as well as everyone interested in contemporary architecture. Office Buildings in Finland
Publisher: The Association of Finnish Architects’ Offices ATL
Publishing company: Rakennustieto Publishing
Graphic design: Katri-Liisa Pulkkinen
46 euros, VAT incl.
ISBN 978-951-682-808-7 More information: architect, executive director Vesa Juola/ The Association of Finnish Architects’ Offices,
vesa.juola@atl.fi
Books are available from the publisher, online shopand Building Centre bookshops. |
 |
Wood Architecture in Finland Photographed by Jussi Tiainen
Wood Architecture in Finland presents examples of Finnish wooden architecture from recent years, superbly photographed by Jussi Tiainen. The book features ten intriguing wooden buildings, each an essential part of people’s everyday life: offices, houses, schools and training centres, leisure centres and churches. The buildings are of different sizes, designed in different styles and built using different methods – from the small and intimate St. Henry’s Ecumenical Art Chapel, with its fish-like form, and the Kärsämäki Church, a modern building built using traditional 18th century building methods, to the Metla Building, the first modern wooden office building in Finland, which has a flexible fir glulam post–beam–slab structural system. This diverse selection of buildings has one common feature – they are all built with the most sustainable and ecological of building materials: wood. Wood Architecture in Finland Photographed by Jussi Tiainen
Publishing company: Rakennustieto Publishing
ISBN: 978-951-682-847-6
143 pp.
45 euros, VAT incl.
Books are available from the publisher Rakennustieto Publishing, our online shopand Building Centre bookshops. Link to the online bookshop presenting the book |
 |
Alvar Aalto Summer Homes
Alvar Aalto Summer Homes continues the series devoted to
Aalto’s housing designs. If one wants to find something in Aalto’s architecture that is essentially Finnish, his numerous summer villas, many of which have remained unknown even to experts, would be a good example. Alvar and Aino Aalto married in autumn 1924. A daughter was born the following year and a son in the beginning of 1927. Like the typical Finnish family, the Aaltos built for themselves a summer villa...
(Markku Lahti) Alvar Aalto Summer Homes presents small, intimate and personal summer houses and saunas designed by Aalto – his early works as well as later ones that have been published only rarely. Also included are two summer homes that Aalto designed and had built for himself: Villa Flora (designed together with Aino Aalto), from Aalto’s early production, and the world-famous Experimental House. The summer homes featured in the book were designed by Aalto for his relatives, close friends or clients for whom he had already designed larger commissions. Villa Vekara, the Korpikoto Hunting Lodge, Villa Kihlman, the Enso-Gutzeit Country Club and Sauna, Villa Eino Manner and Villa Oksala were all individually designed and took into account the wishes of the client. As Aalto wrote in his well-known article “From doorstep to living room” (1926): “But if you want my blessing for your home, it should have one further characteristic: you must give yourself away in some little detail...” Alvar Aalto Summer Homes is the third part in the Rakennustieto series of books devoted to Aalto’s housing designs and it complements the picture of an architect who despite his international career preserved a genuine touch for Finnish nature and the Finnish way of life. Previously published in the series: Alvar Aalto Apartments (2004) and Alvar Aalto Houses (2005). ALVAR AALTO SUMMER HOMES
Photographs: Jari Jetsonen
Texts: Erkki Helamaa
Article: Scott W. Wall
Foreword: Markku Lahti
Graphic design: Leenamaija Laine
Rakennustieto Publishing, 2007
128 p.
ISBN 978-951-682-857-5 Books are available from the publisher Rakennustieto Publishing, our online shopand Building Centre bookshopsand bookshops around the world.
Link to the online bookshop presenting the book
|
 |
10 Years of Emission Classification a Thousandth Ml Classification Granted 27 November 2006
The Building Information Foundation RTS has been granting emission classifications for building materials since 1996. The emission classification of building materials, the M1 Classification, places requirements on materials used in ordinary work and residential premises with respect to good indoor air quality.
M1 classifications have been granted continuously, and to top off the 10th anniversary, we reached the limit of one thousand classified products in November 2006. The Building Information Foundation RTS decided to award the holder of the classification a certificate of honour. The certificate will be presented in December to the Swedish Eco-Boråstapeter Ab, whose wallpaper was the thousandth classified product.
The Finnish system of classification has established a solid position in building products markets outside the home market as well. There are currently classified materials from a total of 115 companies in, for example, the Nordic countries, Britain, Estonia, the Netherlands, South Korea, the US and Vyborg, Russia. Furthermore, active negotiations are under way in other countries. One reason for participation is the straightforwardness, reliability and clarity of the system, which is constantly updated. The same tests are conducted for all materials and products, and test results are evaluated by an impartial working group subject to a committee.
Classifications have been awarded to building materials and air-handling components representing a variety of product groups in the Building 90 classification system, making it possible to build a house using only low-emitting or comparable materials. The frame and roofing products, insulation products, wooden products, wind-protection products, air-handling components, building boards, floorings and wall coverings, plasters, fillers, screeds and surface finishing products cover nearly all materials needed in construction. For additional information on classified building materials and air-handling components, please visit www.rts.fi. For more information, please contact:
Ms Laura Sariola
Tel. +358 20 7476 309, mobile: +358 40 832 5750,
email: laura.sariola@rakennustieto.fi
pressrelease in pdf-format
Archipelago Essays on Architucture
| Twenty-three essays and poems from a range of architects, curators, academics, historians, philosophers and students, represent the breadth and diversity of Juhani Pallasmaa’s friendships and his presence in the dynamic of architectural culture. However, a parallel intention of Archipelago is to open further doors and windows into architecture’s past, present and future. Each of the essays can be read as singular efforts in research or meditation, immediately accessible to anyone concerned with the essential nature of the discipline and the ethical practice of the profession. Archipelago is a gift given twice over: once to an inspiring Finnish architect and scholar Juhani Pallasmaa for his 70th birthday, and a second time to the ongoing discussions of architecture existing and continuing well beyond the boundaries of this immediate archipelago of participants. Essays by Marlon Blackwell, Kenneth Frampton, Kristian Gullichsen, Karsten Harries, John Hejduk, Mikko Heikkinen, Dan Hoffman, Steven Holl, Markku Komonen, Esa Laaksonen, Daniel Libeskind, Robert McCarter, Alberto Pérez-Gómez, Nina Stritzler-Levine, Philip Tidwell, Billie Tsien, Leslie Van Duzer, Ben Weese, Cynthia Weese, Tod Williams, Colin St. John Wilson, Peter Zumthor Archipelago
Essays on Architecture
Edited by Peter McKeith
232 pages
42 euros
ISBN-10: 951-682-806-X Books are available from the publisher, online bookshopand Building Centre bookstores. Archipelago - Essays on Architecture - press release
(.pdf 65KB) |
 |
Zumthor Spirit of Nature Wood Architucture Award 2006
| “There is a special feel to living in a room of solid joined beams, a room not simply clad in wood but made of wood through and through”, says Peter Zumthor, the fourth recipient of the international Spirit of Nature Wood Architecture Award. He explains in his interesting article “The Body of Wood” his ideas of designing and constructing traditional log cabins. This book presents three projects by him: Haus Luzi , realised in 2002, and Haus Annalisa and Pension Briol which are still plans. These are featured with beautiful watercolour sketches, and models and plans, which give a good idea of the designing process.
Zumthor
Spirit of Nature Wood Architecture Award 2006
Publisher: Wood in Culture Association
Publishing company: Rakennustieto Oy
80 pp
44 euros
ISBN 951-682-807-8 Link to the online bookshoppresenting the book
Zumthor - press release
(.pdf 44KB) |
 |
the book Villas and Saunas in Finland published by Building Information Ltd
Villas and Saunas in Finland presents summer villas and saunas in Finland, from the marine archipelago via lake district to the fells of the north – a total of 44 individually-designed buildings that represent the best of recent Finnish summer home and sauna architecture.
Harri Hautajärvi, editor in chief of the Finnish Architectural Review, has selected the sites. They all differ from each other in interesting ways, ranging from simple log cabins to spacious villas. Each site is presented in detail through photographs and texts by the architects themselves.
In his two articles Harri Hautajärvi tells in a fascinating and multi-faceted way about the history and present trends of Finnish villa architecture and life. He also reviews the challenges of sustainable development to holiday-home buildings of the future.
Villas and Saunas in Finland is intended for anyone who is interested in summer villas, cottages and saunas; for their owners, for those of dream of owning one as well as designers and students in the field.
Villas and Saunas in Finland
Harri Hautajärvi
44 euros
232 pp.
ISBN-13: 978-951-682-780-6
ISBN-10: 951-682-780-2
Link to the online shop presenting the book Villas and Saunas>> |
|
Encounters Archituctural Essays in the RIBA Bookshops 2005 International Book Award final in London
The book Encounters - Architectural Essays written by Finnish architect Juhani Pallasmaa and published by Rakennustieto (Building Information) was in the run for the RIBA Bookshops International Book Award. The book was one of the six books that made it to the final Short List. The author Juhani Pallasmaa, Finnish architect, educator and critic is leading figure in contemporary architecture and design culture.
For more information see the press release(pdf 80 kb). |
 |
Alvar Aalto's Masterpiece - Villa Mairea a DVD Film
Alvar Aalto’s Masterpiece – Villa Mairea is a sensitive documentary film written, filmed and directed by Rax Rinnekangas. Villa Mairea was the home of Maire and Harry Gullichsen, designed by Alvar Aalto and built in Noormarkku, the Ahlström ironworks estate in 1939.
The narration for the film has been written by architect Juhani Pallasmaa, who is also the film’s narrator. He leads the viewer through the rooms of Villa Mairea, and helps in understanding the different levels of Aalto’s philosophy as well as the building itself, a building which has become one of the icons of modern architecture.
For more information see the press release(pdf 50 kb)
|
 |
Alvar Aalto Houses + Alvar Aalto Apartments + Alvar Aalto Masterpiece Villa Mairea
Alvar Aalto Houses:
The book presents eight single-family houses by Aalto from 1920s to the end of the 1960s, built in Finland, Estonia and France. Alvar Aalto Apartments:
Alvar Aalto Apartments opens views into Aalto’s ideals about dwelling. The internal organisation of an apartment, the relationship of the home to the outside world, the movement from one space to another and the city on the hill were all issues of importance in Aalto’s deliberations, as he tried to solve the problematics of dwelling. The book presents ten apartment blocks and two student dormitories by Aalto built in Finland, Sweden, Germany, Switzerland and the United States, from the 1920s to the end of the 1960s. The world-famous architect Alvar Aalto (1898-1976) designed the Villa Mairea for Maire and Harry Gullichsen as a family home at Noormarkku near the west coast of Finland in 1939. Situated in a pine forest adjoining an old sawmill, it was to become one of the most notable and most lasting icons in modern architecture.
This film reveals the world of the Villa Mairea as a unique reality influenced by both Finland´s own architectural heritage and Japanese culture. DVD, duration 26 min. Text: English, Finnish. NTSC-disc. More information at our online shop>>
|
 |
Building Information Bookshop
You can buy publications of our own as well as building industry related publications from companies in Finland and abroad.
Our publications consist of instructions for building and property management, regulations, contract documents, forms and product information both in printed format, on CD and on the Internet. Also a wide range of books on architecture and construction, as well as magazines include the company's publishing products.
For more information visit our online shop http://kauppa.rakennustieto.fi/en/default.asp |
 |
|