Industrial heritage
The Cradle of Industry
Finlayson - cotton mill and palaces
First among equals
The Little Palace - an elegant building with a unique history
Tampella - woven from the water
Tako and Tampella: red bricks and long-standing tradition
Frenckell - rags to riches, woods to wealth
The Cradle of Industry
The history of Tampere is tightly linked with the history of factories and mills, of which Finlayson, Tampella and Frenckell belong to the most important ones. All were once powered by the Tammerkoski Rapids, which also gave birth to the whole city. Today, the rapids together with old red-brick factory buildings make one of Finland's national heritage landscapes.
Finlayson - cotton mill and palaces
James Finlayson, a Scotsman, came to Finland via Russia and founded a cotton mill in Tampere in 1820, thereby creating what was to be the first major industrial establishment in the country.
As elsewhere in Europe, the first large-scale industry focused on cotton, since cotton was best-suited to mechanical processing: to be woven into thread and fabric. Finished products were sold to Russia; the export of the goods was promoted by generously granted customs and tax reliefs.
From the very beginning, Finlayson's cotton mill exemplified the state-of-the-art technology in the field world-wide. The required technology and know-how were acquired from England, the leading industrial country in those days.
From the 1830's to 1900's, Finlayson was a town within a town. The new owners of the factory, the Nottbeck family, ruled the community like an enlightened king rules his kingdom: they provided employment, housing, a school, food, a home for the elderly, a hospital and a church.
Finlayson introduced large water wheels and turbines in Finland, as well as an automatic fire-extinguishing system. In the late 19th century, Finlayson also boasted the largest steam engine and the first electric light bulb (1882) in the Nordic countries.
The necessary skills and know-how were acquired from England: drawings for machinery and buildings, as well as foremen to run the various departments of the factory.
Completed in 1837, Finlayson's six-storey factory building, called Kuusvooninkinen is the most significant monument of Finnish industrial history. It was the first building designed for large-scale industry, where halls had no partitioning walls. Instead, the intermediate floors were supported by cast iron pillars.
Today, Kuusvooninkinen is a protected building, and the National Board of Antiquities and Historical Monuments is supervising its restoration.
Co-operation between an architect and an engineer shaped the industrial architecture, of which the multi-storey buildings in the Finlayson area provide an excellent example. Even though the sounds of weaving and spinning machines have died away, the buildings are still full of activity; they house various businesses, studios for artisans and artists, exhibitions spaces, college premises and sports facilities.
Today, the Finlayson Area also hosts a variety of museums, such as the Spy Museum, Werstas Labour Museum, Steam Engine Museum, Textile Industry Museum, Rupriikki Media Museum and TR1 Visual Arts Centre.
Moreover, there are cafés and restaurants, bars and pubs, a 10-screen cinema theatre and a children's theatre in the area.
The Little Palace - an elegant building with a unique history
Former Finlayson mill manager's residence, Pikkupalatsi - the Little Palace - is a fine example of Neo-Renaissance architecture in Tampere. Completed in the 1890's, the newly restored town house was recently converted back into a private home, but it also houses recitals, concerts and other events as well as guided tours of the building.
While new technologies introduced in the wood processing industry turned Finnish forests into green gold and steered Finland's economy to a new direction, another driving force of the economy began to gain ground, namely the engineering industry. Finnish factories needed grinders and water turbines, ships and locomotives.
All of the above were manufactured by Oy Tampella Ab, founded beside the upper reaches of the Tammerkoski rapids in 1861.
During the Second World War, Tampella began to manufacture arms and ammunition. After the war, the factory started to make paper machines. Machinery felts, in turn, were manufactured by the town's largest wool factory, Tampereen Verkatehdas, for use in the wood processing industry.
Today, most of Tampella has been converted into a residential area, but, for example, the Vapriikki Museum Centre and Tampere Comedy Theatre also have their home there.
Turbines and mechanical wires for the purposes of industry are still produced in Tampere.
In the same place as 130 years ago, mechanical pulpwood is being ground at Tako - today M-Real -, and shipped to paperboard mills, where it will be converted into high-quality packaging materials, which will be used in industrial applications worldwide and eventually end up in the hands of consumers.
The forests remain the foundation of the Finns' well-being. Roughly 70 per cent of the country is covered with forest, making the forest-related industries the second-largest generator of export revenue in Finland after the metal industry. Finland is the leading exporter of printing and writing paper worldwide.
Tampere was a pioneer in the wood processing industry in Finland. Established as early as 1783, Finland's first paper mill operated by the Tammerkoski rapids. In 1842, Frenckell's paper mill was the first to purchase a paper machine and manufacture paper from a mixture of rag and groundwood.
The first groundwood mill that manufactured groundwood for the industry was founded on the lower reaches of the Tammerkoski rapids, right about where M-Real Tako groundwood mill stands today.
It was established by the father of Finnish wood processing industry, Knut Fredrik Idestam. A couple of years later, Mr Idestam launched the wood processing industry on the banks of the Emäkoski rapids in the neighbouring Nokia, and the skills and knowledge soon spread out all over the Tampere region; Carl Johan Helin began to apply Idestam's methods in Valkeakoski and G.A. Serlachius in Mänttä.
Today, the Frenckell premises are mainly occupied by municipal offices and departments, but the main building also houses one of the city's theatre stages.
GoTampere Ltd - Tourist Office - Railway station, Rautatienkatu 25 A 33100 Tampere, Finland - Tel. +358 3 5656 6800 - gotampere@gotampere.fi
