The Olympic gap: planning and politics of the Helsinki Olympics

ABSTRACT The Olympic Games of 1940 were due to be organized in Tokyo, Japan, but because of the Sino-Japanese war, the event was hastily re-scheduled to be organized in Helsinki, Finland. The Second World War however interrupted the preparations. Instead of 1940, the Games were organized in Helsinki in 1952. It thus became necessary to prepare twice for the same event. During the 12 years that had passed, the political situation had become significantly different, while also views concerning architecture and urban planning had changed. The postponed Helsinki Olympics represent an intriguing case in the history of Olympic Games, that has remained relatively little researched. This paper proposes that this 12-year ‘Olympic gap’ brings to view on one hand the need to prepare twice, and on the other hand, the processual, slow nature of building and planning, which continued almost uninterrupted. A close reading of period newspaper articles, history of urban planning and architecture, as well as studies of the Olympic Games reveals tensions between architecture, planning, and politics on local, national, and international level, as they unravel in the context of preparing for the Helsinki Olympics.


Introduction
In the history of Olympic Games, the Helsinki Olympics stands out as a rare case due to the postponement that eventually lasted for more than a decade.Originally, the Olympic Games of 1940, officially known as the Games of the XII Olympiad, were planned to take place in Tokyo, Japan.After the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, the Games were re-scheduled to be organized in Helsinki, the capital of Finland.Outbreak of the Second World War however left no other option but to cancel the Games in the spring of 1940.In 1947 Helsinki got another chance, when it was granted to host the Games of the XV Olympiad.
In the history of the Olympic Games, it has happened in very few occasions that the Games have been cancelled and the host city has been able to organize the Games later.In the cases of Berlin 1916/  1936 and Tokyo 1940/1964, the delay was much longer, and the infrastructure built for the first games could be utilized only to a small extent or not at all.In contrast, in Helsinki, the arenas that had been built for the 1940 Games were possible to take to use, and even the organizing committee consisted partly of the same people, when the Olympics were held in 1952.The previous also brings forth the focal dilemma: The 12-year 'gap' makes the case of Helsinki so fascinating, because the political high degree of autonomy.Attempts by the Russian authorities to restrict this autonomy at the turn of the century led to widespread resistance, one form of which was sports.Finnish athletes took part in the Olympics from 1906, and the team´s dazzling success in the 1912 Stockholm Games and the attention it brought to Finn´s political aspirations, made sporting an integral part of the nationalist movement.The sporting success continued just as impressive after Finland gained independence in 1917 at the Antwerp, Paris, and Amsterdam Olympic Games.The fact that a nation of only three million people was able to compete on an equal footing with nations like Britain, France and the United States reinforced the image of Finland as a modern Western country.At the same time, it helped dispel racialized notions about the low origin of the Finns, which were common at the time. 4ports played an important role also in domestic politics.After the independence, the highstrung political divisions resulted in the Civil War of 1918 between the Red Guards and the White Army, which ended in the victory of the latter.The brutal war, with its terror and prison camps on both sides, created divisions between social classes and political groups that took decades to expire.This was reflected in all areas of the society, including sports.Workers' sports clubs either resigned or were expelled from the conservative Finnish Gymnastics and Sports Federation [Suomen Voimistelu-ja Urheiluliitto, SVUL] and founded the Finnish Workers' Sports Federation [Suomen Työväen Urheiluliitto, TUL] in 1919.While the conservatives saw sports, especially the Olympic Games, as a means of diverting workers attention away from socialism and creating a sense of national unity that crossed social classes, TUL condemned the Olympics as a 'hotbed of national hatred' and a 'sabre-rattling of the decadent bourgeoisie', banning its athletes from participating.Instead, TUL joined the Socialist Workers' Sport International (SWSI), founded in 1920, which began to organize the International Workers' Olympiads.In these competitions, the TUL team achieved equally great success as SVUL´s athletes in the Olympics. 5he wish to organize the Olympic Games in Helsinki was expressed soon after the 1912 Stockholm Games, and the discussion intensified throughout the 1920s.The practical problem was the lack of sports venues, above all a stadium of international standards.Creating a new stadium thus became an important national project from the beginning.The earliest known stadium plan had been drawn up as early as 1910 by the Helsinki City Gardener Svante Olsson, on the site where the Equestrian Stadium of the 1952 Olympic Games was later built. 6It is not known where this idea for the project came from, but it must have been influenced by the Stockholm Olympic Stadium, which was under construction at the time and was closely followed by Finnish reporters.After Finland's independence, numerous locations for the stadium were proposed across Helsinki, but lack of funds hindered any of these plans from materializing.The stadium project took on strong political significance, when the right-wing sports leaders introduced the idea that it should serve also as a memorial to the fallen athletes of the White Army. 7inally in 1927, it became possible to develop the stadium project on stable financial basis, as the city of Helsinki and the major sports organizations established the Stadium Foundation.Notably, from the very beginning both SVUL and TUL were major partners in the foundation, even though there was no other form of cooperation between them at the time.Whereas SVUL hoped that the stadium would become the main venue for the future Olympic Games, TUL envisioned to use it for the Workers' Olympiads.This cooperation was not always viewed favourably by either side.For example, the nationalist politicians initially opposed granting state subsidies to the foundation, due to the concern that left-wing and Swedish-speaking organizations could theoretically form a majority in its council of representatives. 8From the beginning, the Stadium Foundation was chaired by Erik von Frenckell, who soon became the key person behind the Helsinki Olympics project through his numerous roles: he was an important sports leader, a municipal and national politician as well as the Deputy Mayor responsible for urban planning of the capital.

Sports, independence, and the city
In 1928, the stadium project took on a new ideological meaning, as it was decided to combine it with a project for a monument celebrating the country's independence.Later that year was organized a competition for the Independence Monument.While expectations were high, the results were considered as a disappointment, and there was no political will to promote the project further. 9In the meantime, a still relatively unknown architect Alvar Aalto had managed to turn the debate onto a new track by proposing that instead of a traditional monument, Finland should celebrate its independence by building a stadium both for sports and national mass events. 10Aalto's proposal quickly gained widespread support, and even the organizers of the monument competition praised his proposal, in which a modernist stadium was placed on the Tähtitorninvuori Hill overlooking the Southern Harbour of Helsinki (Figure 1).
It is hardly a surprise that the idea to unite the symbolics of independence and sports became inseparable in the politicized debates that followed.An independent nation-state had been a common goal for both conservatives and socialists, but views on the events leading up to the Civil War were strongly divided.The organizers of the competition thus aimed to create a monument whose symbolics all Finns could associate with, regardless of their political beliefs.Prominent social democratic politicians were thus involved in the project, but the initiative came from the conservative side, and largely on its terms.For this reason, the left-wing newspapers suspected that the true motivation behind combining the Independence Monument with the stadium project, was to make the arena a vehicle for the bourgeoisies' politics. 11The conservatives, on the other hand, had doubts whether many of the events to be held at the stadium would be too rowdy, thus posing a too stark contrast to 'the solemn, patriotic mood, that the Independence Monument should be able to evoke in the spectator'. 12owever, the primary objection to Aalto's proposal was not any of the previous ones, but the suggested location.The placement was criticized on the basis that it would destroy a beloved park in the centre of Helsinki and would not allow enough space for the necessary training fields.The Stadium Foundation therefore began to push for the construction of a large sports park in an area called Eläintarha Park, two kilometres north of the city centre, where a sports field and several football pitches already existed. 13n association with its new location, the stadium became part of an even more ambitious and controversial vision to build a new monumental centre for independent Finland.This created a yet new layer to the existing debates, making the stadium project ever more complicated.The idea of a monumental centre had first been introduced by architect Eliel Saarinen in his 1918 Greater Helsinki Plan (Figure 2).Saarinen´s idea was to move the Helsinki Railway Station (a building he had designed himself) three kilometres north to the Pasila area, and use the vacated area to build a new business district along a 100-metre wide highway, which he called Kuningasavenue [King's Avenue] after the newly elected King of Finland, Prince Frederick Charles of Hessethis happened a few months before the parliament approved the new constitution which made Finland a republic.In addition to the railway yard, space for a new business district would have been created by filling in two small inner bays: Töölönlahti and Eläintarhanlahti close to the old city centre. 14Their fate later became a subject of great controversy, which eventually turned Saarinen's vision futile.The new business blocks would also have covered a large part of the Eläintarha Park, the history of which dates to the mid-nineteenth century.
In the economically difficult years following independence, there were no opportunities to implement Saarinen's grand vision.In 1924, however, a town planning competition was organized with more strictly defined guidelines.These requirements included keeping the Railway Station in its existing site, and preserving the Eläintarha Park as a recreation area, as part of the Helsinki Central Park, which had been established 10 years earlier.In addition, the competition programme outlined the need to design ceremonial surroundings for the new Parliament Building, for which a separate competition had been organized slightly earlier. 15The winner of the town planning competition was architect Oiva Kallio, who was appointed to design a revised version, completed in 1927. 16The city authorities however did not approve the plan, leaving the future of the city centre in limbo for years.
Despite the prevailing uncertainties, the Stadium Foundation organized in 1930 an idea competition for a sports park to be built in the Eläintarha Park, with the purpose of allocating a site for the stadium.The lack of an up-to-date plan for central Helsinki and conflicting goals of different parties were reflected in the competition programme.A prime example of the complications was that a wide traffic lane was to be built through the Eläintarha Park, without any information as to how it should be connected to the future street network in the surrounding area. 17Of the awarded entries, only Antero Pernaja´s and Ragnar Ypyä´s design took as its starting point Oiva Kallio's recent town plan, which included a rondelle and a Pantheon-like building positioned at the southern part 14 Jung, Pro Helsingfors. 15"Töölön asemakaavakilpailu Helsingissä," 15-28. 16"Helsingin keskustan asemakaava," 141-8. 17Program för Helsingfors stadions och idrottsparks idetävlan, MFA, competition archive.
Eläintarha (Figure 3).The above-described debate about the Independence Monument had in turn led to the fact that the programme called for the monument to be designed as part of the stadium.Participants interpreted this requirement in a variety of ways, including public plazas, colonnaded forecourts, towers, and other secondary structures in their projects. 18It is therefore hardly surprising that the desired solution for the sports park was not found through this competition.Furthermore, the competition did not provide credible propositions as to how the stadium should be positioned in the area, but the issue remained to depend on the completion of the new master plan.
After the competition, the disputes took on yet another turn.This new debate concerned the question whether such a large sports park could be built at all in the Eläintarha Park.In addition to a stadium for 25,000, spectators the Stadium Foundation's aim was to build numerous training fields and arenas for different sports and user groups.These included for example a children's playground with a swimming pool, an outdoor swimming facility, a sports hall, and training fields for women and girls, for whom then-prevailing opinion considered competitive sports unsuitable and who therefore were considered to need separate fields. 19The Finnish Association of Architects, on the other hand, argued that the competition had only proven that by following the existing programme 'the park character of the area would be completely destroyed and its importance as a place for the residents to spend time outdoors would be lost'.The association, therefore, suggested that the sports park and the stadium would be moved a few kilometres further north, to an area called Ruskeasuo, which the Stadium Foundation, however, considered far too remote. 20

A modern arena
Meanwhile, the city authorities argued that it was necessary to wait for the completion of the new master plan.Receiving a statement that had been commissioned from Eliel Saarinen in the autumn of 1931 was a noteworthy step in the process.Saarinen, who had emigrated to the United States in 1923 due to lack of larger commissions, acknowledged Kallio's plan as an 'architectural masterpiece' but viewed that the overtly restrictive conditions of the 1924 town planning competition had led the project down the wrong path.In Saarinen's view, the guidelines he had outlined in the 1918 Greater Helsinki Plan still provided best possible conditions for Helsinki to develop into a metropolis. 21The assistant town planning architect Berndt Aminoff then drew up a new master plan based on Saarinen's guidelines.The implementation was divided into three phases, the first of which covered the area in front of the newly completed Parliament Building and a new main road called Valtakunnantie [National Road] leading north along the eastern side of Töölönlahti Bay.The second phase involved filling in the Töölönlahti Bay and constructing new commercial buildings in its place, and the third moving the Railway Station to the Pasila area (Figure 4). 22The master plan also determined the final location of the stadium: a visible site in the Eläintarha Park, on a small hill rising at the north end of a long park vista, with space for a monumental entrance plaza to the south.Aminoff justified the decision by asserting that if the stadium was placed further east, as in the winning design of the 1930 competition, the planned main road would pass too close to it, leaving limited space for car parking. 23he two-stage architectural competition for the stadium was launched soon after.The arena, with capacity for around 20,000 spectators, was required to be expandable for the future Olympic Games with temporary seating for additional 15,000. 24In addition to Finnish politicians and experts, among the jury members was the German architect Richard Konwiarz, who had won a bronze medal in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympic Art Competitions for his design of the Schlesierkampfbahn stadium in Breslau, Silesia (today Stadion Olimpijski in Wrocław, Poland).His invitation to be a member of the jury speaks of the close cultural relations between Finland and Germany in the early twentieth century.Konwiarz also shared his knowledge with his Finnish colleagues about modern stadiums in an article he wrote for the Arkkitehti magazine. 25n the first phase, the competitors were given Aminoff´s master plan as a starting point for positioning the stadium on the proposed area.The jury, however, felt that the axially accentuated, symmetrical designs led to 'violent arrangements and expensive terracing constructions', thus advising abandoning the geometrical town plan and preserving the park-like character of the area. 26In the second phase, the layout of the adjacent area was even more strictly defined: here, the parking area and forecourt formed a monumental entrance on the south side, while on the north side was a straight road leading to the stadium.In this case, the jury preferred the proposals where the arena was positioned asymmetrically in relation to the axis of the south side, thus allowing the building to be positioned more naturally in the terrain. 27In other words, during this process, the rigid symmetry of Aminoff's master plan gradually gave way to more informal urban design concepts.
Just like in the 1930 competition, also this time many participants proposed some kind of tower for the stadium, and in the second stage it was given as an explicit requirement.However, the massive corner towers, reminiscent of the Stockholm Olympic Stadium, which had been popular in 1930, now gave way for more dynamic and modernist designs.Some of the entries were clearly inspired by the slender tower of the 1928 Amsterdam Olympic Stadium, which was no doubt familiar to most Finnish architects and was featured also in Konwiarz's article.The desire to connect the Independence Monument to the stadium was again included in the competition programme, but it was expressed so vaguelypossibly intentionallythat the participants could interpret it as they wished: 'The competitors have the option of presenting the stadium in one way or another as a monument of independence, but preferably in such a way, that the stadium itself constitutes this monument.' 28In some entries, the tower served as an Independence Monument, while in others, the otherwise plain facades were decorated with monumental sculptures, reliefs and pylons.
The first-prize design by architects Yrjö Lindegren and Toivo Jäntti placed the slender 72-metretall tower at the southern end of the main grandstand to culminate the entrance axis (Figure 5).Upon its completion, the tower immediately became a recognisable symbol for the Stadium and Helsinki as a whole. 29Lindgren´s and Jäntti´s design, like the other award-winning entries, was uncompromisingly modernist.It appears these did not evoke any notable public discussion, although at the time, there were heated debates about whether modernism was an appropriate style for prominent public buildings such as churches. 30A telling example is the Helsinki Main Post Office Building.Two young architects, Jorma Järvi and Erik Lindroos, won the architectural competition in 1934.After receiving the commission, their senior colleague Kaarlo Borg was appointed to collaborate in the project, to turn the design more traditional and thus better suited with the neighbouring Parliament Building. 31n the case of the Stadium, such conflicts seem to have been absent, although Johan S. Sirén, the architect of the neoclassical Parliament Building and modernists´main opponent in many conflicts, was a member of the competition jury.It is possible that as a new building type, the stadium had no established models to follow, thus allowing the architects more freedom.In addition, Alvar Aalto's widely publicized project for the Independence Monument served an example of a modernist stadium, thus in its part potentially affecting the public opinion.In Finland, modernist architecture was also less closely associated with the political left than in Central Europe or other Nordic countries.As a result, in Finland even an institution as conservative as the Defence Forces became an important supporter of modernism early on. 32hortly after the stadium competition, another key project, the Helsinki Exhibition Hall [Messuhalli], was decided to be built in the vicinity of the Stadium.The assigned site was next to the Stadium´s parking lot, as the idea was that the empty area could also be used for outdoors exhibitions.The hall itself was planned to serve a dual function, on one hand as a space for trade fairs, and on the other hand for sports events, thus extending the use of the planned sports park.After a competition held in 1933, the design of the Exhibition Hall was entrusted to second prize winners Aarne Hytönen and Risto-Veikko Luukkonen, who had also come second in the stadium competition. 33y 1935 the Exhibition Hall was already in use, three years before the Stadium.The gleaming white modernist architecture created a recognizable connection between the two buildings.According to the original plan, the connection between these two structures would have been emphasized even more by an 8-storey hotel at the southern end of the Exhibition Hall, marking the arrival to the stadium area. 34However, due to a lack of funding, the hotel complex was never realized.
Construction of the Stadium began in the beginning of 1934 but also in this case due to the lacking funds, the project was not completed until the summer of 1938 (Figure 6).For the same reason, the construction of the eastern grandstand was postponed, with the intention to complete it, when the Olympic Games would take place.The incomplete section in the arena was thus nicknamed the 'Olympic gap'. 35The first public event, celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Civil War was held at the Stadium in May 1938.While this first event strongly expressed the patriotism of the White Army, a few weeks later, at the inauguration ceremony, the athletes of SVUL and TUL were jointly taking part, giving the arena quite a different symbolic meaning.In his speech, the Minister of Education, Uuno Hannula, stressed that for the first time since the independence, representatives of the two sports federations took jointly part in a sports event.The Minister stated: 'Here, inside the walls of our stadium, an internal border-fence has fallen to the ground.Finnish athletes, who dared to compete with other nations, to beat others, have now dared to compete also with each other, nationally, and win the hardest contest of all: conquering themselves.' 36 The opportunity for this was offered a few weeks later, when Helsinki was unexpectedly tasked with organizing the Games of the XII Olympiad.
In 1938, the political climate was in every way receptive for adopting the Stadium as a symbol of national unity.At the beginning of the decade, right-wing radicalism had threatened the fragile Finnish democracy, but after that its influence had rapidly diminished.Since the spring of 1938, Finland was ruled by a coalition government of the Social Democrats and the centre-right Agrarian League, which began to implement ambitious social reforms.This cooperation between the right and the left also marked the organization of the Olympic Games.

A green metropolis
When the Stadium was completed in 1938, its surroundings were very different from what had been envisioned in the early 1930s.The Main Post Office Building was completed in the same year, but these two buildings remained the only projects implemented on basis of the 1932 master plan.In retrospect, it appears that this is largely explained by the strong criticism levelled against Aminoff´s plan by the younger generation of architects.With their sharp writings, the modernist architects succeeded in turning the public and local politicians against the master plan.The debate focused on the fate of the Töölönlahti Bay, but it also included a wider discussion concerning the future of Greater Helsinki, and the principles of urban planning in general.
Among the most vocal critics was the architect Pauli Blomstedt, who argued that the Töölönlahti Bay and the surrounding parks should form a vital, green heart of the city.Instead of sacrificing them to an expanding business district, he asserted that the dilapidated residential blocks of the old centre should be redeveloped for commercial use.Blomstedt was also highly critical of Saari-nen´s and Aminoff´s argument that Helsinki could only expand northwards.Instead, with the rapid increase of motor traffic and the development of bridge-building technology, it was more likely that the city would spread to east and west, along the coast and main roads. 37This indeed Figure 6.Stadium with the so-called 'Olympic gap' in 1938 (Helsinki City Museum.Photo: Rantanen). 37Blomstedt, "Helsingin tulevaisuus I," 49-55; Blomstedt, "Helsingin tulevaisuus II," 134-7; Blomstedt, "Helsingin tulevaisuus III," 163-9.
happened after the Second World War.Blomstedt's inspirations and networks in urban planning remain under studied, but his writings and personal library evidence that along with Scandinavian practises, he was acquainted with the ideas of Le Corbusier, CIAM and works of Soviet planners, 38 which could have affected his visions of Helsinki as a green metropolis.
Illustrations of Blomstedt's ideas for the centre of Helsinki can be found in his design for the 1932 stadium competition (Figure 7).In his vision, the Central Park started in front of the Parliament Building, continuing along both sides of the Töölönlahti Bay to the Eläintarha Park and expanding further north as a forested zone.Töölönlahti was even connected to the Taivallahti Bay in the west by a canal, and its northern end was extended around the Mäntymäki Hill.While the other competitors tried to design the stadium as a highly visible monument, Blomstedt landscaped it as part of the Eläintarha Park with the help of earthen ramparts surrounding the stands.Blomstedt also opposed Saarinen´s and Aminoff's idea of directing all incoming traffic to a single main street, instead proposing two traffic lanes on both sides of the Töölönlahti Bay, the eastern one leading towards north and the western one to the stadium. 39 few years later, Blomstedt returned to the question of connecting the stadium to the Töölönlahti Bay in an article focusing on Helsinki´s surface waters: 'In the context of the stadium issue alone, inland waterways have a unique significance.Now that the stadium is being built as a monument to independence, the possibility that it could be in the immediate vicinity of Töölönlahti could not be more valuable.Apart from this natural swimming stadium, the fact that almost two kilometres of storm-protected sand beaches could be planned in the city centre has an irreplaceable value.It must be obvious to everyone by now that this fact is of immense importance not only for the sporting life, but for the health of the capital and its inhabitants in every respect.' 40 This charming vision was, however, very far from the urban reality of industrialized Helsinki.The sugar factory located on the shore of Töölönlahti and the sewers leading to the Bay had polluted the water over the course of the past hundred years.The reputation of Töölönlahti was thus quite the opposite of health and recreation, and cleaning the Bay's water was achieved only decades later.
After this heated public debate, the idea of filling the Töölönlahti Bay was soon abandoned.This also meant that envisioning the Stadium as part of the monumental centre had to be discarded.At this point, the city authorities turned their attention to the surroundings of the Parliament Building.During the last years of the 1930s several alternative versions were presented, but these all faced equally harsh criticism from modernist architects. 41In the end, the younger generation of architects managed to convince the politicians that the only solution was to held an open competition for the reorganization of the central parts of Helsinki. 42The competition however had to be postponed due to the outbreak of the Second World War.
bidding process turned, however, into a political game between the major powers, in which Finland was left empty handed.Initially, Rome was regarded as the most favourable applicant, but Japan invested heavily in both funds and political influencing in its bid for getting the Games to Tokyo.Just before the IOC meeting in February 1935, Japanese diplomats managed to persuade Mussolini to withdraw Rome's application in favour of Tokyo, which resulted in the selection being postponed until the Berlin Olympics during the following summer. 43This surprising turn of events made Helsinki the strongest European candidate, and Finland stepped up campaigning with new intensity.In a multilingual brochure published in 1936, Finland´s bid was justified both by its strong sporting culturestatistics showed that, relative to its population, Finland had been the most successful country at the Olympics since 1912and by its sporting venues, such as the newly completed Helsinki Exhibition Hall and the Stadium under construction. 44At the last minute, London entered the race, but withdrew at the request of the Foreign Office, which believed allowing Japan to host the Olympics would curb Japanese military aggression in the Far East. 45uch to the disappointment of Finns, Tokyo was chosen as the host of the Games of the XII Olympiad in July 1936.
In the Finnish domestic context, there were no signs as to how the dispute between SVUL and TUL might be resolved, and the latter showed no interest in the Olympic Games.Instead, TUL applied for the fourth Workers' Olympiads to be held in Helsinki in 1943, which was confirmed by SWSI in May 1938.Meanwhile, the escalation of the Second Sino-Japanese War put the Tokyo Olympic Games in jeopardy.After a long hesitation, Tokyo cancelled the Games in July 1938, after which Helsinki immediately announced its readiness to host the event. 46This is when TUL and the Social Democratic Party took a positive stance on the organization of the Games, and a representative of the labour movement joined the organizing committee.At the same time, negotiations between the sports federations began, which led to a cooperation agreement in April 1939, enabling TUL's athletes to participate in the Olympic Games for the first time. 47ith only two years to the opening of the Olympic Games, planning for the sports venues, accommodation and other necessary infrastructure was started in haste.Fortunately, numerous sports facilities had been completed recently in the Helsinki area.These included the Westend Tennis Centre, completed in 1936, where fencing competitions were to be held, the Equestrian Stadium in Laakso, and the Malmi Shooting Range, both completed in 1937.The Helsinki Exhibition Hall, which had opened in 1935, was to host wrestling, weightlifting, and boxing competitions.
As originally planned, the newly completed Stadium was expanded immediately.A new grandstand completed the unfinished east side, and the arena was surrounded on three sides by temporary wooden stands.The construction work, which was completed in the autumn of 1939, increased the capacity of the Stadium to 62,000 spectators.At the same time, the building became known as the Olympic Stadium.The most important venues that were still needed were a swimming stadium, a velodrome, a rowing stadium, and a riding hall.As there was no time to organize architectural competitions, the buildings were either designed in the construction office of the city of Helsinki, or ordered from private architects, such as Hilding Ekelund and Martti Välikangas.
Curiously, it is not entirely clear how the exact locations of the new sports venues were decided, because they were not included in the preceding town plans.The Swimming Stadium was built next to the Olympic Stadium, and the nearby football pitches were updated with new stands.Together with the Exhibition Hall, they formed a versatile sports complex, which was, however, less extensive than the plan that had been criticized by the Finnish Association of Architects in the early 1930s.The other venues were placed in park areas within a couple of kilometres.As described earlier, the Stadium and the adjacent sports park were originally conceived as a central part of the Helsinki´s new monumental centre.However, when this plan did not materialize, they then became part of a completely different urban vision.Instead of monumental squares, wide avenues and perimeter blocks, the central element became the green areas, among which the sports venues were located (Figure 8).Even the marathon route was supposed to meander along forest paths through the 44 Jukola, Finland and the Olympic Games. 45Polley, "Olympic Diplomacy." 46Nygrén, Olympiatuli, joka sammui sodan tuuliin, 22-26. 47Hentilä, Suomen työläisurheilun historia 1, 469-78; Kokkonen, Kansakunta kilpasilla, 204-6.
Central Park.The Olympic buildings can thus be considered to have realised Pauli Blomstedt's vision of Helsinki as a green metropolis.
Architecturally, these new arenas followed the same principles that Lindegren and Jäntti had defined when designing the Stadium: elemental geometry, exposed concrete structures and unadorned white painted surfaces.According to Hilkka Högström, an expert on Olympic architecture in Helsinki, there is no evidence that the architects responsible for these buildings would have ever had joint meetings to decide upon the architectural programme.She considers that the architectural unity was a result of both the common stylistic doctrine internalized by the architects and the active role of the Deputy Mayor Erik von Frenckell as the primus motor of the Olympic project. 48Furthermore, except for the discussion on the Independence Monument, it was never suggested that the Olympic buildings would hold any explicit political message.Comparing these clean-lined modernist buildings, placed among nature in a seemingly free manner, and the main stage of the previous Olympic Games, the strictly authoritarian Reichssportsfeld in Berlin, it is however evident that these embody very different ideals.Since the mid-1930s, Finland had systematically utilized modernist architecture to promote an image of a democratic industrial country.The most famous examples of this are the pavilions designed by Alvar Aalto for two World´s Fairs: Paris 1937 and New York 1939.The Olympic buildings can be seen as part of the same projectnot least because the New York pavilion also served as an advertisement for the Helsinki Olympic Games. 49he vision of Helsinki as a green metropolis was realized also in the Olympic Village [Olympiakylä], located along the same green zone in the northern parts of Helsinki.Although due to the cancellation of the Games global histories of Olympic housing have often overlooked Helsinki´s Olympic Village, 50 it was a pioneering project in the sense that the athletes were to be housed in permanent residential buildings for the first time.In the two previous Olympic villages, Los Angeles and Berlin, accommodation had been arranged in temporary bungalows or army barracks.Even in Helsinki the decision was not self-evident.Initially, three alternatives were studied: in addition to apartment buildings, the other alternatives were construction of a new military base or a student village.
In autumn 1938, the city of Helsinki accepted an offer from the newly founded Helsinki Housing Cooperative [Helsingin asuntokeskuskunta or Haka] to build a residential area in the Käpylä district.With Haka, the cooperative movement, which had close relations with the Social Democratic Party, expanded its activities into social housing.The Olympic Village became its first major project.The Olympic Village also became the first large urban housing area in Finland which was designed on basis of modernist principles.The plan for the area outlined around 30 apartment buildings, a small commercial building, and a heating centre.It was produced on a short schedule by five well-known modernist architects: Alvar Aalto, Kaj Englund, Hilding Ekelund, Georg Jägerroos and Martti Välikangas. 51In the following stage, Ekelund and Välikangas took over the design of the actual buildings.The plan, based on free-standing buildings oriented to the sunlight, was clearly inspired by the Central European Siedlungen and their Nordic interpretations, but there were also notable differences in the approach to the environment: the existing trees and rock formations were preserved, and four-storey point blocks were built at higher points, while three-storey buildings were placed elsewhere following the terrain.
The Olympic Village was to accommodate around 3000 male athletes.For moral reasons, it was not considered appropriate to accommodate around 400 female athletes participating in the Games in the same area, so the state accelerated the construction of a nursing college, designed by architect Uno Ullberg, in the Meilahti hospital area.Another state project boosted by the Olympics was the new Cadet School in Santahamina, a military island southeast of the city centre.The building complex, which was designed by architect Olavi Sortta and included Finland's second indoor swimming pool, was intended to provide the accommodation for the Finnish team. 52In addition to these, the Helsinki Civil Guard Building under construction near the Rowing Stadium was reserved as accommodation for rowers and canoeists.
With around 250,000 inhabitants, Helsinki was the smallest city to host the Summer Olympics after the first Olympic Games in Athens in 1896.Thus, ensuring accommodation for the athletes was difficult, but offering lodging and other services such as dining and entertainment for foreign visitors presented an even greater challenge.At the time, tourism was still underdeveloped, and the city´s hotels and guesthouses had approximately 3000 beds, while it was estimated that some 120,000 visitors would travel to Helsinki for the Games. 53It was evident that the hotel capacity 49 "Suomen New Yorkin-näyttely," 4, 8. 50 See e.g.Muñoz, "Historic evolution"; Della Sala,"The Olympic Village." 51"Olympialaiskylän alueelle 37 rakennusta," 3. 52 Mäkinen, Suomen valkoinen sotilasarkkitehtuuri, 203-11. 53"Matkailukongressi jatkoi eilen vauhdikkaasti työtään," 3.
could not be significantly increased within just two years, and other means for accommodating visitors had to be found.For this reason, every possible solution was taken to use, from accommodating the tourists in private homes, schools, and other public buildings to docking passenger ships in city ports and even setting up tent camps. 54ortunately for the organizers, the end of the 1930s was a time of rapid economic growth, and many commercial buildings were built in Helsinki.A few large projects could thus be rushed, to be completed in time for the Olympics.The most significant of these was the commercial block that the SOK cooperative built next to the Main Post Office Building, at the starting point of the stillplanned main road leading north.The complex, which was named Sokos after the developer, was designed by the architect Erkki Huttunen.It included a department store, a restaurant for 1400 customers, office spaces, and on the top floors a hotel, which with its 180 beds was the largest in the country. 55The building´s rounded corner and strip windows recall the modernist commercial buildings designed by Erich Mendelsohn, while the white the grey natural stone cladding gives the building solemnity, required by the central location.
The short preparation period did not allow the implementation of large infrastructure projects.Fortunately, a modern airport had been completed in 1938 in Malmi, north-east of Helsinki, and its runway was extended for the Olympics.In addition, the construction of a new quay at Helsinki´s Southern Harbour was started in view of the increasing shipping traffic, but the terminal and administration buildings were not completed until the 1952 Olympic Games.

The postponed event
A significant part of the construction work for the Olympics was completed in the early autumn of 1939, when the increasingly tense political situation threw the whole project into uncertainty.In August, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany surprised the world by signing a non-aggression pact, which included a secret additional protocol that divided large parts of Northern and Eastern Europe into their spheres of influence.In this division, Finland was left at the mercy of the Soviet Union.After Germany invaded Poland at the end of August, initiating the Second World War, the Soviet Union demanded territorial exchanges from Finland purportedly to ensure the security of Leningrad.The Finnish government refused to submit to these demands, and in late November the Red Army launched a full-scale offensive.In this conflict, known as the Winter War, the Finnish army was able to defend the country against an overwhelming enemy for more than three months.In early March the Finnish government however had to accept onerous peace terms, including the surrender of about 10% of its land to the Soviet Union.At the start of the invasion, the Soviet leaders had been confident that the Finnish working class would not defend a country that was ruled by the heirs of the White Army, but this turned out to be wishful thinking.The external enemy helped the nation to forget its internal political conflicts.This was also true in the sphere of sports, where SVUL and TUL cooperated more closely than ever before.
After Germany invaded Poland, the construction of the sports venues and the Olympic Village had slowed down, but the work did not fully halt until the outbreak of the Winter War.The World War caused also collateral damage.For example, the Germans sank the ship carrying water purification equipment for the Swimming Stadium in the North Sea. 56Nevertheless, throughout the 54 Friman and Härö, Olympiakaupunki Helsinki, 99, 105. 55Ibid.,100-2.
Winter War, as part of the propaganda aimed for both foreign and domestic audiences, Finland stuck to the plan to hold the Olympics in Helsinki the following summer.For this reason, the Games were officially cancelled only April 1940, after the German invasion of Denmark and Norway.
As compensation for the cancellation of the Olympics, a Commemorative Competition of the Fallen Athletes was organized at the Olympic Stadium on 20th July 1940, the planned opening day of the Olympic Games.Athletes from both SVUL and TUL participated in the event, and soon after, the federations signed an official cooperation agreement.The next major event was the Finland-Sweden-Germany Athletics International in September.Nazi Germany, which had caused the cancellation of the Olympic Games, now brought its symbols to the streets of Helsinki (Figure 9). 57The event coincided with the political rapprochement that Finland and Germany started after the Winter War.This was not so much due to ideological reasons, but above all, because of the common enemy, i.e. the Soviet Union.The cooperation led Finland to a new war with the Soviet Union in June 1941, when Germany launched Operation Barbarossa.This conflict, known in Finland as the Continuation War, ended with the Moscow Armistice in September 1944.The war also led to the cancellation of the planned 1943 Workers' Olympiads, an event that was not revived in the changed political circumstances after the war.During the war years, the Olympic Stadium´s tower got a new function when it was used as an observation point for air surveillance, and for some time the Air Defence Command Centre for all of Helsinki was in the Stadium.
At the end of the war, Finland found itself in a difficult political and economic situation.According to the Moscow Armistice, the country was obligated to pay heavy war reparations to the Soviet 56 Järvi, "Uimastadion," 102. 57Kokkonen, Kansakunta kilpasilla, 229-30.
Union, significantly slowing down post-war recovery.Furthermore, the Soviet Union aimed to influence Finland´s internal affairs through the Allied Control Commission stationed in Helsinki and a military base in Porkkala, only 30 kilometres from the capital.Despite these difficulties, Helsinki applied to host the Games of the XV Olympiad in 1952, and somewhat surprisingly, won the June 1947 vote over Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Amsterdam, Chicago, and Detroit.From today's perspective, it is easy to see that the IOC took quite a risk in awarding the Games to a country whose political and economic situation was very fragile and which only a few years earlier had been allied with Nazi Germany.
In their study, John and Margaret Gold have placed the Helsinki Olympics, along with the London 1948 and Melbourne 1956 Games, in the third phase of Olympic history, called Austerity.All three events were marked by post-war economic difficulties, a low-key approach, and the utilization of existing venues. 58In the case of Helsinki, it was indeed very reasonable to use of the venues built for the 1940 Games.In this situation, however, many of the sites needed repair, renovation, or expansion.For example, work on the Swimming Stadium had been interrupted when the war broke out, and its grandstand had been used for years as herring and root vegetable storage, but now the swimming facility was finally completed. 59The Rowing Stadium, on the other hand, proved to be too windy, and was used only for canoeing competitions.Temporary stands were thus erected in a more sheltered place for the rowing competitions. 60The Helsinki Exhibition Hall was expanded with a second hall, which was used for gymnastics, wrestling, weightlifting and basketball competitions. 61he most significant change, however, concerned the Olympic Stadium.The temporary wooden stands built in 1939 had fallen into disrepair and were replaced by concrete ones.In addition, a new wooden temporary extension was built around the Stadium, increasing its capacity to 70,000 spectators.As result of these interventions, the Stadium acquired a fan shaped exterior, which still characterizes it today (Figure 10).In terms of architecture, the modernist sports buildings were not as avant-garde as they would have been 12 years earlier.Despite of this, they fulfilled their purpose, conveying the message of Finland as a modern industrial country and a Western democracy.This became especially clear when the clean-lined Olympic buildings were compared to the newly completed Soviet Embassy with its bombastic classicism.
Although the setting was almost the same as 12 years earlier, the political landscape in which the Olympics were held had changed dramatically, both nationally and internationally.According to Rennen Ward, 'The Helsinki Games were a mega-project that aimed to (re)connect Finland and its capital to the West.' 62 Based on the Finnish sources, however, the story is somewhat more complex: in addition to the West, it was in Finland's interest to keep good relations with the Soviet Union, and this same division characterized also the domestic politics.Being on the losing side in the Second World War meant the nationalism that had dominated Finnish politics since 1918 could not be as openly expressed.The Moscow Armistice required banning of political parties and organizations that were classified as 'fascist', and the Communist Party of Finland emerged as a significant political force.Furthermore, Finnish historians have called the period 1944-1947 ´Years of Danger´, because of the real possibility that the communists could have seized power with the support of the Soviet Union, as happened in the Eastern Central Europe.However, the 58 Gold and Gold, "Athens to Athens," 31-32. 59See note 56 above. 60Ekelund, "Soutustadion," 114. 61Kolkka and Matson, The Official Report, 51. 62 Ward, CityEvents, 140.
Paris Peace Treaty of 1947 and the Agreement of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance of 1948 stabilized the relationship with the Soviet Union, and the final war reparations were delivered a few months after the Olympics.The Games thus became an opportunity for Finland to show to the international community that it had remained a Western democracy, while affirming to the Soviet Union that economic and cultural cooperation with Western countries did not pose a threat.For this reason, the organizers worked hard to ensure that the Soviet Union would send its athletes to Helsinki.
In the interwar period, the Soviet Union had stayed out of the Olympic movement and participated in the Workers' Olympiads organized by the SWSI only in 1936 to support the Popular Front policy. 63It was only after the end of the Second World War that the Soviet Union gradually began to approach the international sports movement and joined various sport federations.Finally, in April 1951, the newly founded Soviet National Olympic Committee applied for IOC membership, which opened the possibility to participate in the Helsinki Games.In December, the Soviet Olympic Committee tentatively accepted the invitation to the Games, but the confirmation was not received until just before the opening ceremony in July. 64n parallel with this rapprochement process, however, the relations between the Soviet Union and the Western powers deteriorated into the Cold War and in 1950, into open conflict in Korea.The struggle between East and West thus left a deep mark on the Helsinki Olympics, that became visible in the sport venues, in the cityscape, and in the medias.Both superpowers strove to influence the local inhabitants of Helsinki and the foreign tourists through various Figure 10.The Olympic Stadium in 1952 with the Töölönlahti Bay on the background (Finnish Heritage Agency). 63Gounot, "Sport or Political Organization?". 64Parks, The Olympic Games, 1-25.
means.While the Soviets arranged political rallies, organized youth camps, provided movies and other free entertainment, the Americans rented a movie theatre in the city centre to show free propaganda films. 65However, the inhabitants of Helsinki, who had been accustomed to regulation of consumer goods for more than a decade, were probably more impressed by the American goods.For example, Coca Cola, which was the main sponsor of the Olympic Games, came available in Finland for the first time.

Accommodating to the Iron Curtain
The presence of the Cold War was most evident in the athletes' accommodation, which was the largest construction project for the Games.Since the apartments in the Olympic Village built for the 1940 Games had been sold to private owners, a new residential area called Kisakylä, 'the Village of the Games', was built next to it for the use of 4800 male athletes (Figure 11).The Olympic Construction Office, headed by architect Pauli Salomaa, was responsible for the design of residential buildings, along with numerous temporary structures needed for the Games.Kisakylä was in many respects a continuation to the former Olympic Village: the 3-4 story apartment buildings were placed to border the spacious yards, while the lower commercial buildings lined the main street.The rather ascetic facades were enlivened by colourful walls, the shades of which referred to the Olympic rings.A large temporary canteen was set up in the area for the meals of the athletes, while medical services, pharmacy, cinema, and office spaces were set up in the existing schools and a library building.
The female athletes were originally supposed to be accommodated in student dormitories in Otaniemi, 10 kilometres west of Helsinki, where Alvar Aalto had planned a new campus for the University of Technology.The red brick dormitories, designed by architects Heikki Siren and Martti Melajärvi, were placed following the contours of the wooded plot, following the emerging urban model that became known in Finland as the ´forest suburb' (Figure 12).Another celebrated example of this concept, the garden city of Tapiola, was being built a couple of kilometres to the west. 66In addition to dormitories, a restaurant, a sauna, training fields and a sports hall designed by Aalto was built in Otaniemi, the last one demonstrating the Finnish wood processing industry´s ability to create buildings with large spans.
The accommodation arrangements, however, had to be reconsidered when the Soviet Union decided to participate in the Olympics.For the Soviet leaders, the idea of their athletes living in the same area as the Western participants was unacceptable, but Otaniemi offered them a sufficiently remote place for this purpose.The area thus provided accommodation for athletes from the Soviet Union and its satellite countries, and in doing so, pulled the Iron Curtain across Helsinki.The female athletes, on the other hand, lived in the nursing school built for this purpose in the late-1930s.Another more distant site was the Cadet School on the island of Santahamina, where the Finnish team stayed, also in this case following the plan of the 1940 Olympics.
This time, there was more time to prepare for the Olympics, and it was also possible to invest more on the improvement of several different infrastructure projects.These included a new airport in Seutula, 20 kilometres north of Helsinki (today Helsinki Airport), which could be used by larger aircraft, and the so-called Olympic Terminal in the Southern Harbour, designed by Aarne Hytönen and Risto-Veikko Luukkonen, the architects of the Helsinki Exhibition Hall.Another addition to the iconic South Harbour cityscape was the Industrial Centre, a block-sized headquarters for the 65 Rider, Cold War Games, 63-64. 66See e.g.Berger, Ruoppila and Vesikansa, "Baltic Crossings," 2019.Union of Industries and Employers.According to Anja Kervanto Nevanlinna, the purpose of this spectacular project was to underline the role of the employers' organizations as a counter force to the political left and the trade union movement, which had significantly strengthened after the war. 67he building's modernist architecture and many technical innovations can also be thought of as an effort to emphasize Western values.The art history professor Lars Petterson has asserted that, it 'exuded a kind of cosmopolitan spirit, grandiose in tone and somehow "American"'. 68Despite of these visions, it is nevertheless more likely that the architects Viljo Rewell and Keijo Petäjä sought their inspirations from the works of Le Corbusier, instead of contemporary American architecture.On the top floors of the Industrial Centre there was the 60-room Hotel Palace, but during the Olympics it did little to alleviate the lack of hotel rooms in Helsinki, as it was reserved entirely for IOC members.The situation was thus almost as miserable as it had been in 1940, even though Hotel Vaakuna had finally been completed on the top floors of the Sokos building.Accommodation for the guests was therefore solved by the same means as 12 years earlier: at private homes, shared accommodation and even tents. 69he restaurants in Helsinki were not expected to be able to serve the estimated number of visitors, and therefore 14 outdoors restaurants were set up in different parts of the city.Of these, the restaurant called Fish and Chips in the city centre was aimed specifically for foreign tourists.Temporary open-air cafés were built all over the city in squares and parks.Leisure activities were offered at the Linnanmäki amusement park, opened in 1950, which was located on a hill overlooking the Eläintarha Sports Park.The amusement park was something that had already been planned for the 1940 Olympics, but at that time it had not been realized due to the short preparation time.Furthermore, some exemptions were made to Finland´s strict alcohol policy, for example allowing bar stools, which had been banned until then as a measure to prevent prostitution. 70In response to the large number of customers, the state alcohol monopoly Alko developed ready-to-drink mixes for restaurants.Of these, the Gin Long Drink, made of mixture of gin and grapefruit lemonade, has remained a popular drink to this day.This, and many other things that have since become ordinary and mundane, are telling of the legacy of the Games.
Lindegren-Kråkström's plan drew its inspiration from two recognisable sources.Firstly, from the ideas that Pauli Blomstedt and other modernist architects put forth in the 1930s, and secondly, the recent international trends in urban planning.The architects divided the city centre into functional zones in accordance with the principles of the Athens Charter.The Olympic buildings and their surrounding parks formed the 'sports, leisure, and recreation zone' in the northern part of the planned area.The same urbanist principle had been applied to the 'cultural and public activity zone' to the south of them, where the public buildings, to be realized in the future, were arranged in a string encircling the inner bays with extensive parks around them.To the front of the Parliament Building, which was previously thought to be the symbolic centre of the nation, was now proposed a multi-level interchange and a bus station. 73The desire to create a monumental urban space, which still had prevailed in the late-1930s, was thus abandoned in favour of the then-perceived needs of motor traffic.
The primary idea of the plan was best formulated by Alvar Aalto, a member of the committee that supervised the work.In a 1954 newspaper article, he stated: … Helsinki opens up like an inner crater, the city thus not only has a space in the central parts but also an inner face with expansible views, a valuable and extremely rare asset for a city as large as Helsinki. 74 was only natural that in the next stage, Aalto was given responsibility for planning the city centre, as after Lindegren's death young Kråkström lacked the authority to continue working on the plan independently.However, Aalto's plan, the first version of which was completed in 1961 and the second in 1964, were largely based on the same premises.The recognisable difference was Aalto ´s idea of gathering the most important cultural buildingsor the monumental centrein a chain along the Töölönlahti Bay, as a kind of 'new face' of Helsinki.
From the point of view of architecture and urban planning, preparing for the Olympics provided a context and motivation for imagining Finland as a modern, Western country.While the Olympic Games are essentially an international event, in the context of Helsinki, it provided architects and planners a framework for both discussing and realizing visions concerning how the capital of Finland should be developed.Originally, the task was to focus on the Stadium and the other necessary structures required for the Games, but the project grew to something larger, encompassing visions for Greater Helsinki.In addition, sports architecture was a new, less established category of buildings, and therefore it appears the public was even expecting these structures to represent modernist architecture.Nevertheless, it is difficult to imagine that Pauli Blomstedt's urban vision could have been realized to the extent they did without the context and time that preparing for the Games offered.In retrospect, the 'gap' created by the Second World War was not solely a hindrance, but it refers to numerous things that are telling of potential.The gap was a temporal concept that existed between 1940 and 1952, the epoch was characterized by the ideological 'gap' between different political views, but it also existed physically in the Stadium.Finally, in the urban context, it was like an inner crater, which held open the potential for a new heart of the city.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors
Kristo Vesikansa is an architect and the Editor-In-Chief of the Finnish Architectural Review.Previously Vesikansa has worked as a lecturer in the history of architecture at Aalto University and in several building conservation projects.His research topics include postwar architecture, in particular the works of Raili and Reima Pietilä and standardized timber houses.
Laura Berger is an architectural historian, researcher and teacher at Aalto University, Department of Architecture, from where she received her doctoral degree in 2018, awarded with distinction.Berger's previous 73 Lindegren and Kråkström, Helsingin keskus. 74Aalto, ""Quo vadis Helsingfors,", 28.

Figure 7 .
Figure 7. Pauli Blomstedt's competition entry outlining the stadium and its surroundings 1932 (Museum of Finnish Architecture).

Figure 13 .
Figure 13.Yrjö Lindegren's and Erik Kråkström's plan for the central part of Helsinki 1954 (Museum of Finnish Architecture).