Halls of Kalevala

Our journey thru the Halls of Kalevala
starts from the northern entrance.
Please follow me!

Ladies and Gentlemen:
this building
is an epitome of architecture
the art that gives shelter to
and leads
all the other arts
to the future
and beyond.

We have arrived at a wing housing 36 chambers of innovation
It's a stronghold of research for the brightest minds.
Please heed the warning signs!

As we move on, notice the large empty spaces on the walls
during the next few hundred years they will all be filled with
tomorrow's master painters' frescoes.

And now, the very heart of the building: the Pantheon!

It's time to get down,
down to Tuonela, the Underworld,
a crypt of the champions,
the final resting place for the great and the good.
It is believed they will rise from their tombs
when the worst danger threatens the motherland.

Be careful, the stairs are slippery!

This way, please.

Here, on this exact spot where I stand right now, Eliel Saarinen's visiting colleague Le Corbusier promptly threw himself on the floor and tantrummed: "This monstrous building, like a charnel-house, is strewn with the detritus of dead epochs!"
Fortunately, the possibly awkward situation was averted when Saarinen quickly produced a little packet from his coat pocket: Charlie, I bet I'm more modern and functional than you are: I drew the first plans of this house on a pack of worker man' cigarettes.
And here we have the original pack - you can take photos but no flash, thank you. Replicas are available at the gift shop.

(Choir) The gift shop!

Now we've finally come
to the last section of our tour:
a purgatory of stairs,
404 steps to be precise,
that we need to ascend
in order to reach the paradise at the top of the tower -
a breathtaking panorama,
embracing in one glance
the entire glorious city and its magnificent surroundings.