Helsinki rejects Guggenheim museum plan

An undated artist's rendering shows a design of the rejected new Guggenheim museum in Helsinki....
An undated artist's rendering shows a design of the rejected new Guggenheim museum in Helsinki. Photo: Reuters

Helsinki city council voted down on Thursday (local time) a plan to build a Guggenheim museum in the Finnish capital in a decision that is expected to put an end to the controversial project.

Following a five-hour meeting and lively debate on the subject, the council voted 53-32 against the proposal.

The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation proposed the museum - like ones in New York, Bilbao and Venice - to be built on the Helsinki waterfront in 2011, but the proposal faced resistance from many Finns who considered it a waste of taxpayer money at a time of austerity in the recession-hit country. 

Comments

Funny how the Guggenheim organisation wanted to build the museum but ratepayers were supposed to pay for it.
And fancy the philistines not wanting an ugly black box be planted on their foreshore! After all it was obviously designed by some eminent architect.