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Kari Campus brings together education, culture, and sports under one roof. It houses a comprehensive school, community college, music institute, swimming hall, sports center, and youth spaces—forming a dynamic venue for Rauma’s rich cultural life. Designed for users of all ages, the campus is active every day of the week, offering diverse opportunities for learning, play, and exercise both indoors and outdoors. It expands the city’s public space and strengthens community ties. The design was carried out in close cooperation with the city and the users of the premises. The key task was to find points where the functions of different user groups could overlap and create shared spaces. By close collaboration, a comprehensive spatial solution was found, that is more than the sum of its parts.
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The design of Kari Campus brings out the strengths and uniqueness of Rauma. Forming a continuum with the well-defined street space of the Old Town, the campus is built close to the street. A small open square marks the main entrance. Preserving as much of the natural rock as possible, the square resonates with the rocky islets around the city. The exposed stone connects with the Rauma Library and park across the street. The exterior colors take their cue from the historical buildings in the Old Town. The facades are clad in wood and plastered brick. Steel has been used to enable cantilever structures and to protect the facades from weather stress. Reflecting the identity of Rauma as a coastal city, the colors for the interior spaces are inspired by the tones of the sunrise over the sea.
The Campus provides the residents of Rauma with a modern, eco-conscious hub for education, sports, and leisure. The design incorporates innovative energy solutions, including an advanced energy recycling system that captures and reuses waste heat, significantly reducing overall energy consumption. To promote awareness, real-time energy usage data is displayed to users through an info-TV system. The roofs are equipped with extensive photovoltaic panel arrays, contributing to renewable energy generation on-site. The campus offers charging stations for electric vehicles and excellent facilities for cyclists, encouraging low-emission transportation. The design also preserved existing rock formations, creating a seamless connection between the built environment and the surrounding landscape.
Kari Campus was the largest construction project in the history of Rauma – a result of close collaboration among a wide network of experts. The design process was guided by continuous dialogue with user groups to identify shared needs. The campus brings together several important public amenities: swimming and sports halls, comprehensive school, music and community colleges, and a youth center. By bringing these institutions together and encouraging shared spaces, the project achieved both cost-efficiency and significant operational synergy. Different stakeholders and organizations of the campus can offer facilities, services, and customer flows to each other.
The central lobby space of Kari Campus was designed and built as the center of the campus, as a common living room. The lobby contains several different lounge areas, including a cafeteria and the school dining room. The heart lobby is like a public urban space, a living room for city residents, around which the various different institutions are located.
The exterior colors draw inspiration from the Old Town, while the interior palette reflects the soft hues of a coastal sunrise, reflecting the identity of Rauma as a coastal city. Art is integrated throughout the building and its surroundings, following the principle of allocating at least one percent of construction costs to public art. Kari Campus builds on Rauma’s rich heritage while offering a forward-looking framework for vibrant urban culture.
"Kari Campus is already buzzing with activity. The students of the comprehensive school and their teachers already seem familiarized with the facilities. The students of the music institute, the art school and the theatre school are also enjoying the new campus. The youth centre and the adult education centre are operational and hundreds of enthusiasts are excercising in the sports hall. "The facilities are great" is the spontanious comment from many students, tells campus director Kaisa Eskola.
Verstas Architects is an award-winning architectural practice founded by Väinö Nikkilä, Jussi Palva, Riina Palva and Ilkka Salminen in 2004. Numerous competition wins and acclaimed buildings have established Verstas as one of Finland’s leading architecture firms.
Our philosophy is to consider various perspectives to produce designs that are human-centered. We believe this to be the most sustainable approach to architecture that withstands time. Our team consists of 50 dedicated architects, urban designers, interior and landscape architects who are able to work at various scales from masterplanning down to intricate details. The name Verstas (meaning workshop) describes our methodology which entails close-knit work between clients and the project team to ensure a tailored final design. We enjoy working on demanding projects on highly sensitive sites and seeing them come together through skillful design.
