Introducing Håkansböle Manor – a new Manor Museum in the making
The main building is from 1908, designed by Armas Lindgren. Pekka J. Heiskanen/Vantaa City Museum
Welcome to Vantaa, the fourth largest city in Finland with over 240,000 inhabitants! Vantaa is often called a suburb of Helsinki, Finland’s capital. In many ways, it is a misunderstood city. Extremely high urbanization during the 1960’s and 1970’s shaped the cityscape of the rural municipality. For decades, people have moved to Vantaa for work, love and cheaper and more spacious living. Today, we are a net migration city and also the most multicultural city in the whole of Finland with over 120 languages spoken. But only a few know the variety of environments and the historic roots of Vantaa that go back to the Stone Age. It is against this diverse background that we are establishing a new Manor Museum in Hakunila, Vantaa.
Our manor house Håkansböle, is located in Hakunila, an area best known for its dense residential areas, apartment buildings and a sports park. The district has over 12,000 inhabitants and 35% of them speak a language other than Finnish as their mother tongue. The City of Vantaa bought Håkansböle Manor with its 15,000 objects and 3.5 hectares of historical park already in 2005. Since then, work has progressed slowly but surely. The park has been conserved, the outbuildings have been restored one by one and are now in active use, and research has been carried out. In 2014, local activists set up an association to organize events and guided tours in the area.
Eight buildings and a 3.5 hectare park forms the Håkansböle manor area. Antti Yrjönen/Vantaa City Museum.
Today the Håkansböle Manor area has a restaurant, an old stable that can be rented for weddings and other events, an antique shop, city’s Children’s Cultural Centre, and two summer exhibitions curated by the Vantaa City Museum. Only the main building remains closed. We are now almost finished with the planning of a €3.5 million complete renovation and conservation project, which will take place between August 2024 and December 2025. The city council has decided that the main building will be opened as a mansion museum. In February 2023, I started as the coordinator in the development project. We also have a conservator working mainly with the museum collection objects.
Our goal with the museum is to maintain the feeling of a home. We will focus on the story of the Sanmark family, who were the last owners until 2005. Arvid (1866–1908) and Emilia Sanmark (1873–1918) moved to the just finished manor in 1908 with their four children, but tragically Arvid died right after that. Together with the estate manager, Emilia took care of business, estate and household for over 10 years until her death. In 1919, after the Finnish civil war, her youngest son Per Kasten (1900–1983) took over.
The main building and the flower beds during summer. Pekka J. Heiskanen/Vantaa City Museum.
However, Håkansböle has existed long before the Sanmark family. This is the third main building, the previous ones were from 1760’s and 1844, during Johan Sederholm and Anders Lorentz Munsterhjelm’s period of ownership. This Art Nouveau building was designed by the Finnish architect Armas Lindgren who had become famous for designing the winning Finnish pavilion to the Paris Exposition in 1900 and the Finnish National Museum to Helsinki in 1904, together with Herman Gesellius and Eliel Saarinen. In Håkansböle he worked alone. Lindgren’s main building is fairly well preserved and will be renovated in Art Nouveau and Neoclassical style.
After almost a year into the project, we have created an action plan, a strategy, an organizational model and a service plan for the new museum. We want to make a unique and vibrant estate and a place for building identity, a sense of belonging and city image. Our six goals are: to improve accessibility, build community, protect and enable, support success, strengthen connections and, make Håkansböle a national tourist destination. I warmly welcome all ENCOUNTERS to Håkansböle!
Maiju Hautamäki
Project coordinator, Håkansböle Manor
Light event in the historical garden in October 2023. Sanni Penttinen/Vantaa City Museum.
Vantaa City Museum
Farm chores exhibition and the granary exhibition had approximately 15 000 visitors during the summer 2023. Sanni Penttinen/Vantaa City Museum.