Today's swim was at Kuusijärvi, a small lake and recreation area in Vantaa. I was in Vantaa anyway so it was a natural choice. And what a choice! Such a wonderful, quiet, dark smoke sauna experience, seamlessly blended in the nature. No wonder the next day the saunas were awarded the Finlandia architecture award.
I was here when they were opened last year (article (alt. link), alt. link).
They really are spectacular. As the news paper reporting (Yle, HS) says, they are about the sauna experience rather than bold, aggressive architecture in your eye. In particular I liked that one of the saunas is marked as quiet place, that they have a transition room between the hot sauna and outside, that there's ample cooling of benches outside, how the buildings connect to each other the beach effortlessly and with perfectly placed paths.
And the craftmanship of the building is superb.
Well done, Vantaa. Even at 2M€...
This article has also been published at Planetswimmer.com here. Read the full series of sauna and swimming stories from planetswimmer.com and saunablogger.cool, urban exploration articles at theurbanexplorer.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot. Photos and text (c) 2026 by Jari Arkko. Pool and sauna photos in this article were taken when the facility was empty or closed.
This article was originally published in the Planetskier Blogspot article series.
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