The building of the Embassy of Finland in Budapest was completed in November 1988. Foreign Minister Pertti Paasio inaugurated the building during his visit to Hungary on 14 April 1989.
The house was designed by Ilmo Valjakka. Valjakka intended to integrate the building in the surrounding architectural heritage and make it the best possible representative of Finnish architecture in Hungary.
The designer had to familiarize with local features to preserve and exploit the characteristics and vegetation on the land parcel as much as possible.
The Embassy building in Budapest includes all important functions: offices, the Ambassador's residence, and official quarters. The building has a lecture hall, as well as a library and a reading room open for the public. Finpro rents offices on the first floor.
The real property was constructed by the Finnish Polar Constructions Co. as main contractor in cooperation with a Hungarian subcontractor. The surface area of the land parcel is 5300 m2, the air space of the building is 9600 m3, its total surface area is 2900 m2.
At the inauguration of the building, Foreign Minister Pertti Paasio handed over Akseli Gallen-Kallela's painting titled 'The Danube at Night' as a present of the Finnish Government to the Embassy. The painting was made in 1907, during the artist's first visit to Hungary, when he came to receive the grand gold medal conferred to him for his work titled 'Defense of Sampo'. In January 1908, there was a large-scale exhibition presenting nearly 500 of his drawings, watercolors, and graphics in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest. The artist himself did not attend the opening ceremony, but he was in Hungary from March to May the same year. 'Unfortunately, we are taken care of too well here. - The exhibition in the Etching Cabinet was opened three months ago and is closing today. More than one hundred thousand people have seen it', as Gallen-Kallela wrote to his friend to Finland.
In front of the entrance to the residence, there is the granite statue titled 'Midnight Sun' by Radoslaw Gryta, an artist born in Poland but living in Finland for a long time. The statue was made in 1989. There is a sorb tree growing beside the statue, whose berries are almost blazing in front of the white walls of the building.
The residence is spatious and bright. Internal walls are also plain white; the parquet is made of birchwood. Huge doors link the grand saloon the terrace and the garden, where rambler roses are blooming until the autumn comes.
The beautifully sounding white Steinway piano is the pride of the residence, played by Heikki Sarmanto and Iiro Rantala throughout the years, presenting audiences with unforgettable experiences. Besides, the residence hosted concerts of tango, big band, and the Retuperä Brass Band of Voluntary Firemen as well.
The so-called women's saloon hosts Akseli Gallen-Kallela's oil painting from 1907, titled 'The Danube at Night' and the work titled 'Katariina Maununtytär', made in 1885. The small saloon also offers a collection of high-quality contemporary works of art, loaned to the embassy from Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Fine Arts or the Ateneum, among others. Among the paintings, the one titled 'Kaarina' should be highlighted, painted by Tyko Sallinen in 1932.
In the middle of the residence dining-room, there is a seven-metre dining table made of Finnish granite. The beautiful and graceful glass lamps provide an interesting counterbalance with the granite. There are two Finnish glass statues in the dining-room: 'Grass in the Wind' by Jorma Vennola and 'Kings' Valley' by Markku Salo.
Updated 12/19/2007
