Empty For Decades But Well Guarded

Once again I return to a familiar location, which hasn’t been featured here earlier. It is a former municipal home, which I visited for the first time in 2022, but only turned on the parking lot, when I saw the cameras.

The wooden building at the back is from the 1920’s, the more modern probably from the 1950’s, as in so many other similar places. It was first a municipal home, then a nursing home, and after it was closed, a local couple started an inn there in 1991. They closed in 2005, and the place has apparently been without use since then.

Although closed for a long time and growing thick bushes, the place was guarded. There were cameras on each corner.

The older, 1920’s section had at some point received new windows. They don’t really fit.

The further back you went, the thicker the bushes were. There is a bird watching tower behind the building. It was constructed by the founders of the inn.

The junction of the old and new parts of the building. And a familiar Volvo lurking in the bushes.

Carriages like this were used to transport milk churns back in the days.

And it is no wonder, that they are here. Municipal homes featured often farm animals and fields, because it was believed, that work was good for the patients, especially the mentally ill.

That’s why there was a huge amount of other buildings in the area as well.

Nope. No entry here.

The Final Moment Was An Unpleasant Surprise Part IV

Moving on to the final sections of the upstairs of this building.

And finding another kitchen.

The 1980’s look of the furniture was pretty staggering.

The very messed up main stairway, which I didn’t climb in the earlier post.

Moving on. It gets darker.

But there were still more rooms.

And they did follow the shape of the roof.

The area started having more graffiti. Besides, the plastic parquette is awful.

The usual shit was again written on the wall.

Another kitchen. The upstairs was clearly more like a hostel while the downstairs was more like a hotel.

And the amount of beds actually did seem to confirm that.

More vintage 1980’s furniture.

Well, anything could have happened here.

The view. Of a window.

And another one of the big staircase leading upstairs.

There was a mess of old window glass in the stairway.

And a final view from the top of the stairway.

Sadly these were some of the final photos taken from this location ever. Just a bit than a month later the building burned to the ground. The suspects were underaged, so no charges were ever pressed.

But I am glad, that I managed to catch this beauty, just before its unpleasant end.

The Final Moment Was An Unpleasant Surprise Part III

Back at the porch, it seems.

One more entrance. It looks to lead to the final unexplored part of the upstairs.

And indeed it did.

Well here we have another mess.

Moving on to a lobby.

And reaching room number 4.

What a small room I found.

Judging by the mattresses, this has been a hotel for quite some time.

But there really has been a solarium in here. Well, let’s call it a resort.

Entering a kitchen. Maybe this has been more of a hostel than a hotel, actually.

Another room with beds. And pillows.

The shape of the roof was clearly visible in most of the rooms.

The kitchen was a very 1980’s one. My grandparents’ place had a similar one.

Another room with the roof shape again clearly visible.

And an excessive amount of beds here.

Also some very vintage lamps.

And clearly very vintage TV’s.

Entering another balcony. And the final post from this location.

The Final Moment Was An Unpleasant Surprise Part II

Entering another room, which has clearly been a kitchen.

Well, this clearly has been the main kitchen of the place.

There have even been wine glasses.

And most of the floors have been demolished here, too.

That looks like evidence. Of what?

Moving on inside the building, still avoiding weak spots of the floor.

This has probably been the main entrance.

And this has probably been the restaurant.

Well, somebody has done the dishes.

The place was actually quite a mess.

After the water damage, a lot of stuff must have been just stuffed in here.

What a cozy place to enjoy an occasional pizza. Or a drink.

A painting on the wall depicting a dinner somewhere else. Probably at a functionalistic building such as this one. It could really well have been that one.

Moving on. Looks a lot like the cloakroom and the toilets.

The other end of the restaurant was an even worse mess.

The main stairway up was covered with so much debris, that it was impossible to climb this way.

I could only take a photo that way.

The view from the terrace across the river.

The Final Moment Was An Unpleasant Surprise Part I

Now this was something of an unexpected discovery. My urbex friend told me about a former school closed decades ago and converted into a hotel. During the winter of 2014-2015 there was a massive water leak, which closed the place down. In 2016 the owner applied for a demolition permit for the historically important building because of the damage. The situation was a standstill.

The auxiliary building, which has formerly housed the toilets of the school.

Without further delay I am going in. The floors have been demolished after the water damage, which was pretty extensive.

Theh first hotel room. As you can see, no floor here.

The rescue plan. It has been made by hand.

A look back towards the entrance.

Another room. Still no floor.

The first toilet. It seems to have been built in the 1980’s meaning, that the building has been out of school use for quite a while.

Curtains.

Even the walls had been demolished to some extent. Either by the owners or vandals.

Another partially demolished room.

Yellow curtains here this time around.

Finally some solid floors.

And some stupid graffiti.

A beautiful lamp.

And more demolished floors along with some bags and a VHS player.

Another shower.

Moving around on the damaged floor was pretty slow.

Back at the entrance I first entered through.

Ads of the pizzeria located in the building back in the days.

That was all there was to explore behind the first entrance. Let’s find a second entrance.

It wasn’t that difficult.

Somebody’s got mail…

Built For The Russians, Went Down With The Russians

Welcome to yet another interesting piece of Finnish real estate history. This here is the Zsar Outlet Village built right next to the border with Russia and opened in 2018. Its aim was to serve rich Russian tourists, who were a mainstay in Southeastern Finland back then.

It looks like a historical city, but it is just a replica. There’s a modern shopping center behind those walls.

And as you can already guess, the business model, which seemed good back in 2018 soon ran into spectacular trouble. First came the covid pandemic, which closed the border. Then Russia decided to invade Ukraine, which made the border even more shut. The company running the mall went into receivership already back in 2020, but was kept open. Less than half of the spaces were occupied in the summer of 2021.

The place was declared bankrupt in October 2022 with debts of more than 20 million. It was put up for sale.

As the place is controlled by the receiver, it is well guarded. I didn’t expect to find a way in, but still decided to document this strange monument.

And indeed the gates were well shut.

Next to the old facades was a parking lot with all kinds of modern things like electric vehicle chargers.

There are really no buildings like this in Finland. The place has entirely been designed to Russian taste.

The view from another locked gate. As I guessed, it was all shut.

The mall was auctioned in 2024. A buyer was found, but they never paid the agreed fee and so another auction was made. This time there was a German-Russian buyer, who had ties to Russian oligarchs and president Putin. It is now up to the security authorities to decide, if a permission to sell can be obtained.

Something Fishy Is Going On In Here

When my friend tipped me about the former border control troop garrison, which I unsuccessfully visited, they told me that the building had a twin. It was another border control troop garrison and its fate was almost similar. It had been closed and sold to a Russian owner and abandoned after that.

However, my friend warned me, that there was something going on with the area. There were also other buildings in addition to the clearly abandoned garrison with broken windows and stuff. They had only managed to explore the garrison on their second attempt. During the first attempt they were approaching the area when a huge column of SUV’s with Russian plates loaded with women dressed in fur drove from there. My friends suspected, that this was an illegal brothel.

And that was exactly why I parked my car on a small path leading to a forest and decided to approach the area from the back. There were signs of video surveillance, yes, but there always are and they mean nothing.

When I finally reached the back yard of the building, I noticed, that it had been boarded shut just a few weeks after my friends had visited. This was the first oddity.

The second oddity took place just as I was taking this photograph. I heard a sound behind me. It sounded like someone was riding a scoot or a bike on a dirt road behind me. A sort of a rustle.

And when I reached the other side of the building and took this picture, the third oddity happened. The very loud scream of a swan echoed around the area. It was one single, long scream. And it repeated. The monotonous scream repeated at a fixed interval time and time again, and it was unnecessarily loud.

It wasn’t a swan. It was mechanical. It was a warning sound, but more importantly I don’t think that it was meant to scare me. It was a signal warning about me. When I realized the pattern of the scream, I ran. I ran straight to my car, drove away and parked a safe distance away on the parking lot of a long distance bus stop by a highway. There was definitely something going on in here, and I didn’t want to stay to find out what it was.

Still Chasing The Impossible

Here we are again. At the dairy processing plant, which I have been chasing since 2011, when it wasn’t even abandoned yet. But something has happened isnce the previous visit in 2022. Back then there was absolutely no graffiti on the facade. Now the entire place has been vandalized with large tags.

In addition to that the windows to the low wing have been smashed and covered.

I would really like to know how that one has been made. I mean how has one such graffiti beginner climbed up there and made that?

Moving on to the back side.

I am still longing inside. And still there is no way in. The large glass panel in the stairway seems to be on the verge of collapse by the way.

The remains of the chimney. The old building behind the dairy plant was still inhabited, and so I turned back. But the number of broken and open windows and graffiti clearly indicates, that the building is no longer in active use. Its deteriorating condition also indicates, that it may not be there for that long.

I’ve said it several times, but I’ll say it again. This place is my ultimate conquest. When I will eventually manage to enter it, I can retire.

Very Sad To See this

Next my trip took me to a small rural village, where there is a large former prison. It was closed in 2011, and after that the place has hosted asylum seekers. I’ve been to the village several times to see if there is anything of interest. There hasn’t been yet.

One of the buildings, which caught my attention was a small, two storey functionalistic beauty from the 1930’s. Although clearly well renovated, it was almost in its original shape.

But this time something was different. The yard had become unkept and the building seems to have suffered some damage at least to the plastering of the wall. It looks like the beauty stands empty.

It was originally built as the club house for the prison workers in 1934. There was a kiosk, a post office, a ballroom for 77 people and a canteen. Upstairs were apartments. Throughout its life it served in this purpose, although the post office was converted into another apartment, when the post left the area in the 1990’s. All the way to the very end it was used to accommodate temporary workers of the prison.

But now its future looked worrying.

Waiting For Its End

And welcome yet again to a familiar location. Here we have a sawmill factory workers’ apartment building, which has been empty for years and already has a demolition permit.

I recently shared my previous photos from the same location to a local Facebook group and heard, that it had been converted to a clubhouse at some point. Important for the story, maybe, not important for the building’s sealed future.

Sadly the place remains well sealed and there is absolutely no way in. It is again a race between me and the excavator.