St. Michael Church
- Turku
- 1905
Mortgage House is one of the finest Art Nouveau stone buildings in Helsinki. The building houses Ministry of Traffic and Communications but initially, it was built for the Mortgage Association.
The impressive Art Nouveau style house with a grey granite stone façade was designed by Lars Sonck, one of the key Art Nouveau architects in Finland. The building was completed in 1908.
Typical for Sonck’s works, apart from Art Nouveau, the building has even references to the style known as Nordic Classicism, even the Mortgage House was designed 15 years before to its heydays. Some classicist details of the building are for example the columns, arches and symmetrical windows on the main façade. Throughout his career, Sonck created numerous variations of Eclecticism in his architecture.