projects and articles by members
Promoting the joy of learning through architecture through Arkki
Arkki, the School of
Architecture for Children
and Youth will
be 12 years old in 2005. Its
objective is to promote architectural
education in Finland.
It was founded in 1993 by
three architects, Tuuli Tiitola-
Meskanen, Miina Vuorinen
and Pihla Meskanen. Every
year, Arkki arranges various
courses in architecture for
800 students
Arkki provides continuing long-term courses and various short courses in architecture. Some of the most popular of these are hut-building camps. Creating spaces at 1:1 scale is especially inspiring for young people. By building traditional nomad huts they also learn about history, building traditions, different construction methods and use of natural materials.
Learning in Arkki takes place through play and experimentation. The youngest join the architectural activities in child-parent groups and schoolchildren explore the secrets of architecture in groups of 12 supervised by an architect. Imaginary projects encourage the children and young people to investigate different aspects of architecture through 3D building experiments. Creativity and open-mindedness are encouraged in many ways and mostly the projects result in fantastic discoveries and innovations, or interpretations of space and place. The most important factors in discovering architecture are the learning processes, the pleasure of doing and the joy of learning. There are no right or wrong answers in architecture, but instead many visions and interpretations.
Architecture surrounds us everywhere we go. It creates our daily environment. In addition to being a creative hobby, architectural education gives young people the means to analyse, understand and evaluate their surroundings. This profound understanding enables them to grasp and be part of the decision-making process.
