Could you believe this modern sauna cottage was once a shipping container and temporary school facility?
There’s something unusual inside Hanna and Kimmo Sirainen’s modern sauna cottage: a shipping container originally meant to be a temporary school facility. This unique solution fulfilled the couple’s dream of a monopitch-roofed sauna by the lake.
So, you’re saying this is actually an intermodular container? Hanna and Kimmo are already used to the looks of disbelief when people see their sleek lakeside sauna.
Hanna and Kimmo had been dreaming of a modern, monopitch-roofed sauna cottage—a cabin similar to the one Kimmo had seen in a photo eight years earlier and admired for its appealing looks. They had the perfect spot for a sauna on a scenic shoreline in Nokia, Finland, but on the property, right by the water, stood an old and severely deteriorated lakeside sauna building.
Hanna and Kimmo told about their sauna dream to both a builder and an architect. The builder, Olli Vilppola, suggested building a prototype from a container, and Hanna and Kimmo were on board immediately. They found a container for 2,000 euros from Adapteo, a company providing temporary facilities, which already had the basic structural elements and insulation. Even though the project was unusual, getting a building permit from the City of Nokia went splendidly.
This is the container the sauna is made of:
At first, Kimmo planned to tear down the old building on his own. The excavation contractor, Pekka Alatalja, explained that demolishing it by hand would take two to three weeks, while it would only take him and his excavator a couple of hours. As soon as the building permit came through, the excavator bucket started to make regular appearances on the property.
“The decision to demolish the old sauna with the excavator wasn’t hard. I immediately chose the excavator option. As the digging went on, we were surprised by how many stones we uncovered. We moved them to the edges of the property, which turned out to be very slow,” Kimmo explains.
The sauna cottage under construction:
They removed excess soil from under the new building and replaced it with frost-resistant foundation material. On top of the gravel bed and insulation layer, they poured four concrete beams arranged crosswise to ensure proper ventilation underneath.
“While working on the foundation, we also installed water pipes underground, and at the same time, we ran underground cables from the main house to the sauna cottage for electricity,” Kimmo recalls.
The container arrived on a truck with a large crane. The driver’s skill was put to the test when reversing: there was only a one-centimeter gap between the main house and the truck.
Once the container was set in place, the builder installed roof trusses, roof decking, and a metal roof on top of it. A storage space was added under the rear overhang, as wide as the entire length of the building.
“We also felt comfortable handing the sauna interior design over to our builder.”Hanna Sirainen
“We enlisted a trusted professional, Olli, to take on the project. Throughout the building process, we felt confident that everything would run smoothly with just one contractor handling every part of the construction,” Kimmo says.
“So we never worried when a reciprocating saw—and its operator—cut openings for the windows in the container’s walls. We also felt comfortable handing the sauna interior design over to our builder. Our only requirement was that we wanted to be able to lie down in the sauna,” Hanna says.
After the windows and doors were installed, the exterior was clad in wood, and the interior was coated. The cottage’s decoration was a joint effort. Hanna chose a bold, dark green for the walls and found the idea for the slatted ceiling on Pinterest.
Thanks to Kimmo’s research, they could decide on the main heat source of the living area: an air-source heat pump that could be fitted with different fabric covers to match the decor. Underfloor heating, which spans the entire building, complements the heat pump.
“Sure, Hanna is our interior designer, but I think the air-source heat pump was a fantastic choice. I’ve used to only seeing those plain white lumps,” Kimmo says.
“Kimmo also made another great discovery. While browsing an online secondhand marketplace, he found an Artek daybed that was just what we needed for the sauna lounge,” Hanna says.
When Hanna and Kimmo first climbed onto the sauna benches, the emotions were high. The stress over potentially rising costs and finishing the project eased off, and all their feelings poured out.
Now they can both lay down and fully stretch out on the benches. The whirlpool tub is a cherry on top for their children. The couple really appreciate being able to take a sauna after a long work week.
“One full load of firewood plus a bit extra, and the sauna provides wonderfully humid experience. Then we jump in the lake and come back in. Although our kids prefer to soak in the bubbly water,” Kimmo says.
The excavator arrived in May, and everything was completed in September. The total cost for construction, landscaping, and purchases ended up at 90,000 euros.
“With that sum, we were able to fulfill our dream more fully than we could ever imagine.”
