City as a resource mine: Reuse of existing building and timber components - A workshop and education center in Helsinki

Abstract

This thesis presents an architectural design demonstration on the reuse of modular and prefabricated timber structural elements from a dismantled building to create new architecture. The aim of the thesis is to provide a circular solution for tackling the scarcity of resources and great amounts of waste. The proposed approach involves the hypothesis that Helsinki, facing an excess of office spaces, plans to dismantle the Finnforest Modular Office (FMO) in Tapiola. Based on this hypothesis, the thesis reuses FMO's modular and prefabricated timber components for constructing a Workshop and Education Center on top of an underground maintenance space at the Olympia Terminal in Eteläsatama. In addition, the reuse includes the repurposing of the underground space.

To achieve this, circular solution, the methodology involves literature reviews and case studies. The literature review explores sustainable design strategies for prolonging the life cycles of buildings and direct reuse of timber elements from dismantling processes. As reusing structural components has been practiced throughout history, case studies are used to analyze both traditional and contemporary architecture, emphasizing the reuse of elements to elucidate the processes and benefits.

As Earth's resources continue to decrease and the waste continues to increase, enhancing the efficiency of reusing and recycling building components becomes important. Therefore, future architectural design processes should be advocated starting from investigating existing materials and components and then designing new buildings by reusing them, instead of starting by designing a building and then searching for new materials to fit the design.