Team Helsinki is an international, interdisciplinary group formed earlier this year to take part in the ideas competition Greater Helsinki Vision 2050. The Finnish capital underwent a major transformation during the second half of the 20th Century and emerged as a worldwide centre of technology and innovation.

The Vision 2050 competition asks us to consider the future of the Greater Helsinki region, in light of a changing national and international context. The brief is far-ranging, touching on a number of themes likely to affect the future of the city. The breadth of questions we are seeking to address include:

• What kinds of places respond actively and wisely to global and seasonal climatic change?

• What kind of places put a minimal strain on the eco-system?

• How do we create sufficient wealth to realise the future needs and dreams of the city’s inhabitants?

• What kind of enterprises will sustain them in the future?

• What kinds of places offer creative tension, spontaneity and contact as well as a feeling of safety and well-being?

• What kinds of places offer a concrete vision of humanism and tolerance, of justice and equality, of untapped potential and future possibilities?

• What kinds of places offer every child a hint of what they might be or do?

The idea behind Team Helsinki was to provide individuals from a variety of backgrounds with the opportunity to participate in a collaborative process and collective competition submission. Although a disparate, multi-threaded input was anticipated, the group was formed with no ideological expectation. Rather, the project is seen as a journey: a broken narrative, uncovered, imagined, written and drawn by a diverse group of individuals, each with their own distinct ideological positions and cultural backgrounds. Beyond a consideration of the future of Helsinki, the project becomes an investigation into the potential of a collaborative, creative process operating across international boundaries.

A rough framework and timetable for the project have been established, culminating in the final submission at the end of May 2007, with a team visit to Helsinki at the end March/beginning April. A process suggested early in the competition is divided into three broad, overlapping stages: research, conceptualization and presentation.

Information has been collected and organized according to a number of broad themes, considering topics such as urban structure, housing, education, the economy, culture, society etc. The result has been a number of themed analytical narratives, which attempt to describe Helsinki as it is today and begin to place the city in a cultural and historical context. They form the intellectual foundation of the developing project and provide team members a working knowledge of the city whose future they are considering. The narratives are intended to act as a starting point for a body of ideas and creative work that will help establish a set of informed objectives for the project going forward.

A TEAM HELSINKI blog is used as a communication tool by the group. Its chronological nature encourages an iterative process, as one contributor picks up on the thread of an idea from a former and develops the thought in a perhaps unexpected, perhaps ultimately fortuitous, direction. The use of the blog as a creative tool is entirely in keeping with Helsinki’s position as a global leader in communications technology and its population’s heavy internet use.

Team Helsinki is made up of creatively-minded people from a range of backgrounds, disciplines and nationalities. It is expected to expand through the course of the project to encompass a wider range of expertise and local knowledge. If you would like more information or would like to participate please visit the blog.

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