Nordicum - Real Estate Annual Finland 2010 | Page 53

Riverside Celebration
Turku is getting ready for Capital of Culture 2011

The City of Turku is looking to be immersed in culture in a year’s time. In 2011, Turku will
be the European Capital of Culture 2011, sharing the honours with Tallinn.

M

arketing Manager Laura
Aalto from Turku 2011
Foundation describes the year as
a unique event on a grand scale:
“The Capital of Culture
designation, the contents of the
programme and the audiences provide various companies
with creative marketing solutions and promotions,” she says.
In accordance to the Turku 2011
collaboration strategy, there is a
wide-spread search for corporate partners. The main sponsors
Finnair and Tallink Silja and
other participating companies
are involved in the making of
the year and get value for their
investment through e.g. visibility and boosted sales.
”Participation in the Capital of Culture year is also a way
for the company to make a state-

ment about what type of a corporate citizen it wants to be and
how that company wants to participate in the development of
the community,” Aalto says.

Culture Club
For local companies, there is
even a Turku 2011 culture club.
The idea is to make the local
business scene as committed to
the project as possible.
All and all, the Turku 2011
programme will feature as many
as 150 separate projects which
encompass thousands of individual events. The full repertoire
will be unveiled in June 2010,
six months before the Culture
Capital year is launched.
The 150 projects can be
loosely divided into four areas:

Great experiences, Enjoyable
city, Everyday touch and Lasting imprint.
Professor Alf Rehn has
used the term ”creative infrastructure” to describe those
methods that a city can utilise to support human creativity and find links to business.
One of the research projects of
Turku 2011 is Creatin’ which
will look into the entire Culture
Capital process and explore the
workings of the creative industries.

Retooling
Infrastructure
Coinciding with the festivities, the city is going through
a “fitness programme”: there
are many projects either being

planned or already being implemented around town.
Jouko Turto, Director of
Real Estate Department for the
City of Turku, says that the impact of Capital of Culture designation runs all the way down to
the infrastructure. For instance,
the Library Quarter is about to
be re-energised in a new way. By
adding a bridge – the so-called
Penny Bridge – in the neighbourhood, the access to Vanha
Suurtori (Old Grand Square) is
improved.
“Finally, the Vanha Suurtori quarter really opens up
to the people, as it becomes a
natural part of people’s movement around the city,” Turto envisions. He would like to see
boutiques, cafes, galleries and
restaurants flourish in the area,
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