A hybrid building: Soccer pitch, housing, and a shopping mall

In Tampere, two hours northwest of Helsinki, the renovated Tammelan Stadion hasn’t had to move far from the city center. But it took a decade to build this mixed-use facility. Very mixed indeed: five residential buildings flank a soccer pitch that conceals a large parking lot and a shopping mall.

Besides its occasional use for concerts, the stadium, located on the outskirts of Tampere, also serves as the gymnasium for the Tammela neighborhood. This expands its use as an international stadium — approved by UEFA for international matches and with a capacity of 8,000 spectators, all with excellent sightlines — making it a far cry from the dreaded white elephants: large buildings with very specific uses that disrupt the city’s urban fabric.

Therefore, this two-for-one typology points to a path of urban growth, or repair: the hybrid. It’s not just about densification; it’s also about preserving the memory of the place by adapting it.

Built in 1930, the original stadium was one of the first to be constructed in Finland. The residents wanted to preserve it, but the neighborhood needed to be densified. The solution came from dialogue, collaboration, and innovation. Therefore, it’s no surprise that the project’s authorship is also a collaborative effort. The City Council and the construction company Pohjola Rakennus joined forces with the Helsinki-based studio JKMM for a project that took a decade to conceive, negotiate, and build. How did they reach this agreement?

In 2014, a project titled Hattutemppu (Treble) won the competition, placing as much importance on the neighborhood’s urban fabric, scale, traffic, and even its visible materials as on the identity of an old-new soccer stadium. The project aimed to blend typologies and materials. The residential buildings would have ceramic facades, their roofs extending to cover the stands. The varying sizes of these buildings and the suspended arches forming the roofs along the sides of the stadium would protect the playing field from the wind and, at the same time, define the building’s identity. Even this idea was not arbitrary: the lowest point of the roof avoids casting shadows on the pitch.

Tampere is one of Finland’s most sustainable cities. Its city council prioritizes both densification and revitalization. The stadium embodies both concepts. Its construction involved no demolition, only the preservation and optimization of existing structures, guided by the idea that hybridization is about multiplication.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition