Joenniemi Manor was originally built as a home. It got restored and converted to a museum with a size of 500 sqm of exhibition spaces. Due to the last use of the building large scale travelling exhibitions can not be conveniently displayed in the exhibition facilities. The customer service facilities are insufficient, and the collection and office areas are cramped or inadequate. The functional needs, the different necessary heights and the natural integration in a unique cultural milieu led to the idea to pile up the functions to minimize the groundfloor area of the building and keep as much nature as possible. By this the extension takes a backseat on the site while forming a landmark because of its height.

Wood is known as the most important natural resource of Finland. More than 60% of the country is timbered. This leds to the fact that Finland is the densely wooded country in the EU. Based on this fact, a site on an island that is characterized by trees and the special relationship of Finns to the forrest we came to the conceptual image of a stem. A stem that gets sliced, scaled on each level to fit to the room programm and then shifted to fit to the exploitation.