“How did the multidisciplinary interplay of architectural design and designing experiences create an utterly new and unique destination?“

Case Casino Tampere

Casino Tampere, located in the heart of Tampere, at Nokia Arena, is the first new casino in Finland in thirty years. It is a completely new kind of spatial and experiential environment that aims to provide services and games to registered adult guests responsibly, expertly, and with a good service attitude. There are also other possible ways to spend time for those who want to enjoy the Casino Tampere other than by playing.

The concept, architecture, and interior are designed by MUUAN + Amerikka. The goal of the multidisciplinary design team has been to create a new kind of destination: Nokia Arena, which is a significant attraction in Tampere, which is developing into an event city. Särkänniemi and the Finlayson area have been similar destinations already for a long time. Casino Tampere’s services strengthen Nokia Arena’s events and services.

In terms of its concept, Casino Tampere is an ever-changing place for adults, living in the rhythm of the arena’s events, enriching the content of the Arena. The omnichannel casino is personalized on several levels – from the unique needs of an individual customer to a space that supports the giant events in the Arena.

The events in the Arena continue to the Casino on various screens, thus adding versatility to the use of the facilities and options for ways to experience the events in the arena. The spatial design has sought warmth and transparency. The Casino’s social gaming concepts, combined with a diverse restaurant offering, cater to new types of target groups, creating a responsible, urban, and low-threshold entertainment venue for adults. By developing new conceptual, architectural, and interior design solutions, we have aimed to serve new target groups.

Architecture

The architecture of the casino represents modernity, Finnishess – unique and authentic values. Unlike traditional casinos, the design of Casino Tampere has been based on a human-scale entity. The facilities of the casino offer visitors several places of different sizes and typologies, which are intended to provide the right kind of experiential and social environments for different target groups.

Light, green, and inviting Stream (Virta) is a meandering spatial experience throughout the Casino that combines all the functions of the Casino into an easy-to-use combination. It is an area of enjoyment and social encounters. The architecture of the Stream combines wood construction with intelligent lighting and digital signage solutions, which together form about 250 meters of digital surface for the Casino for various changing contents. The “coves” along the stream have seating areas and lounges where you can enjoy the food from the casino restaurants or, for example, play sports games with the mobile application as an authenticated Veikkaus customer, and at the same time watch sports on big screens.

In addition to customer service facilities, seven different gaming rooms have been designed along the Stream, each with a different theme and a unique environment tailored to it. The smallest of the gaming rooms, Boulders (Kivikko) is Stream’s first stop when arriving from the north entrance. Glitter (Kimalle), located on the Arena courtyard side is designed for individual gaming. The architecture of the space creates exciting lights and flickers. The design of Quarry (Louhos), which has a dim atmosphere, embraces activity that requires long-term concentration and consideration. Mystique (Mystiikka) and Luster (Loiste) offer an arctic color splendor both inside and outside the casino with their spatial solutions. Foam (Kuohu) and Ukko’s rock (Ukonkivi) are designed to introduce new games.

The Casino has two bars of different types. In the middle of the Stream is the Casino Emerald Lounge, which offers Scandinavian tapas, a wide range of cocktails, and mocktails.  In Delta (Suisto), located near the Arena lobby, people can visit Casino Taproom, a brewery restaurant where you can watch sports with a varying selection of beers and snacks. The bars are operated by Noho Partners.

Alongside the design of customer premises, it has been a particularly challenging task to fit the remarkably large technical and back-office facilities into an unobtrusive part of the whole. Also, the fact that the Arena itself, is located near the railway, has been affected on the design solutions from structural solutions to vibrations.

Varying digital content and technology

The identity of Casino Tampere, which is linked with Nokia Arena, is strongly built around the “experience concepts” to be implemented in the Stream. Experiences through different spaces are utilized using digital solutions. The cornerstone of the identity is a core theme consisting of elements found in Finnish nature, which presents diverse seasons, arctic phenomena, and genuine and local materials. The spatial experience is aimed especially at those target groups who are not interested in traditional casino services.

Through programmable and dynamic scenery of lighting, projections, sounds, and scents, visitors are physically part of the experiences across the casino, not just in the gaming areas. Digital surfaces present artistically interesting content whereas essential information about events and tournaments. Event-specific content is an essential part of the interaction between the casino and the Arena, and between the casino and the environment.

Responsibility

Special attention has been paid to responsibility. The design solutions are reflected in the use of durable, locally produced materials, implementation of LED lighting, the economical use of water, and the intelligence of HVAC and automation systems. The Casino as part of the  Nokia Arena has received the gold level of international LEED environmental certification. Social responsibility at Casino means openness, transparency, and togetherness. Responsibility plays an important role in Nokia Arena. Special attention has been paid to the fact that responsibility is already embraced when visiting adults register to Casino through digital identification.