PRESS RELEASE
Dutch real estate developer RED Concepts has transformed a former printing house in the centre of Helsinki, originally designed by renowned Finnish architect Lars Sonck, into a highly sustainable office campus for pan-European media technology company Azerion. The six-storey building, which dates back to the 1930s, has a net floor space of 2,350 m2 and a parking garage, and is located in the trendy Töölö district in the Helsinki city centre. RED has transformed both the interior and exterior of the building, with deep respect for the original details. The building will serve as the new home base for Finnish game developer Sulake, which Azerion acquired earlier this year. RED delivered the building to its client in late February.
Combining work and fun
This state-of-the-art office campus includes a gaming Fun Centre with an auditorium, a game theatre, a conference hall, an art café and of course two Finnish saunas. It is a perfect expression of the new way of combining work and fun. The building will provide work stations for Sulake’s roughly 100 employees, but also for other gaming-related start-up companies. The latter was one of Azerion’s demands.
Office campus with a Finnish twist
In partnership with Finnish architect Kari Lappalainen, RED Concepts has successfully created an office campus that combined the best of Finnish culture with high-tech requirements, state-of-the-art interior architecture and the buildings original 1930s features. The buildings has open stairs and a striking atrium; the original 1930s brickwork has been retained and the 150 windows have all been restored. To top it all off, the walls have been covered in reindeer moss. This has brought together old and new and green and steel in a harmonious manner to give this modern office campus a semi-industrial look and feel with a Finnish twist. The new interior, with each of the six floors given their own colour, and which oozes passion for video games, is a perfect fit with Sulake’s young creative employees. The Finnish contractor NHK Rakennus Oy managed to realise the transformation of the former printing house into an office complex in just eighteen months.
Gawein Minks, RED Concepts owner: “The RED Concepts team is proud to deliver this new office campus to Azerion. We are convinced that the building is a perfect fit with the creative character of Sulake and bid the company’s employees a warm welcome to their new inspiring workplace. The driving force behind the success of this entire project was effective international collaboration and mutual respect. I’ll admit this project was a challenge, as thanks to the Covid-19 crisis the circumstances were certainly not always perfect, but RED likes a challenge. And we’re already looking forward to new outside-the-box redevelopment projects, both national and international”.
Sustainable
RED has applied for a BREEAM Very Good certification and in the near future the company will quite rightly be able to call this a truly sustainable building. In addition to the building’s various sustainable facilities, it also offers charging points for electric cars and other vehicles, along with covered bike parking.