The ongoing structural degradation and landscape erosion being faster than earlier due to climate change and lack of resources, there was a need to develop efficient methods to gain good results in wall repair, maintenance, and in care of the earthworks, which is the living architecture of the fortifications. There was also a need to adapt more greens kills. By this Resilient Fortress project, the Governing Body of Suomenlinna wanted to find peer support from colleagues dealing with the same problematic and having ambition in increasing environmental responsibility in a practical level.
Fortified heritage unites architecture with landscape. The 18th century fortified archipelago Suomenlinna in front of the city of Helsinki, has eight kilometers of fortified masonry walls and earthworks. Since 1990’s they are continuously repaired, maintained and documented. Unfortunately a recent survey proves that the degradation of fortified walls is faster than it was 10 years ago, due to extreme weather conditions and an increasing number of freeze-thaw cycles. Also, the earthworks and their vegetation are more and more eroded due to increasing tourism and specially due to a a big number of low season visitors when, during mild winters, the lack of ground frost makes the landscape extremely vulnerable. Facing the challenges of climate change, the awareness of environmental sustainability has increased in the field of heritage preservation and also in Suomenlinna World Heritage Site. Applying for this project the Governing Body of Suomenlinna wanted to find European partners, with examples of restoration work of fortifications in similar conditions and examples of fortified landscape maintenance, that aims to preserve both the living architecture and the stone monument.