VAHVISTAA : to maintain, to strengthen

Abstract: In Tornedalen the culture - stories, language and music, is carried by the elder people. The knowledge coming from hundred years of life in Tornedalen was learned through a transfer of experiences from one generation to the next. In today’s world, we no longer live in generational spaces, working together and learning from our elders in the same way. This essay focuses on what we can do to find a space to salvage and start a new way of keeping the Tornedalian culture alive for future generations through architecture as a tool. By interviewing and conversing with people and organizations with this knowledge and gathering data through literature, photographs and articles the project described in this essay aims to be a workshop in traditional knowledge from the region and the project site in Vasikkavuoma, Pajala municipality. The workshop is meant to be re-occurring every year; pro-longing the life of Vasikkavuoma and continuing to teach new generations the way it has been done for many centuries. The workshop program is showcasing a way of life unique to this area, and specific knowledge of the nature and surroundings, and how life can be in tune with the landscape. This program also gives attendees a venue to learn, work and to sleep, a living museum of a sorts of Tornedalian life, and a program that keeps on giving by upholding the landscape and giving back to Vasikkavuoma through the years. Architecture plays a role in forming the way we gather and meet – people from all walks of life can through architecture learn and teach as well as meet and connect, provided with a venue to help the cultural traditions thrive and spread, generation to generation. It can in this project be used as a tool to form interaction and cooperation between people, the site of Vasikkavuoma and the Tornedalian culture.