Porvoonjokilaakson kartano- ja kylämaisema (Herrgårds- och bylandskapet i Borgå ådal)

English translation (from the Finnish)

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Description

In the Porvoonjoki valley, north of the medieval town of Porvoo, stretches the flat, open farmed landscape of Kiiala manor and Suomenkylä, which in its most representative form reflects the centuries-long agrarian history of the river valley. Further north in the valley is the smaller-scale manor landscape of Strömsberg.

The building group of Kiiala manor is located on a knoll in the flat Porvoonjoki valley. From the manor, a mixed-species tree avenue runs across the fields towards the town of Porvoo. The villa-like exterior of the two-storey main building of the manor dates from the late 19th century. The park on the east side of the manor, with its garden ornaments, was established at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. The present building stock of the manor includes production buildings from the end of the 19th century, such as the large red-brick distillery.

Kiiala manor has become known as the birthplace of the artist Albert Edelfelt and for his paintings of medieval Porvoo as seen from Kiiala.

Opposite Kiiala manor, Suomenkylä, built on the slope of a moraine and esker hill on the eastern bank of the Porvoonjoki, has retained its compact, linear village structure concentrated along its main street. Old building stock includes, among others, the farms of Lill-Knuts and Nedre Pås.

The wooden main building of Strömsberg manor, built at the rapids of the Porvoonjoki and at a branch of the Pikkujoki, dates in its oldest parts from the late 18th century. The courtyard also includes an old residential building, a grain storehouse, a meadow granary, a threshing barn and a dairy from the 19th century. The terraced formal garden was designed by garden architect Bengt Schalin. On the rapids east of the manor are a red-brick hydroelectric power station built in the 1920s, a mill and dam structures.

Kiiala manor, Suomenkylä, Saksala and Strömsberg manor belong to the nationally valuable Porvoonjokilaakso landscape area and are part of the Porvoonjokilaakso national landscape.

History

The settlement history of the Porvoonjoki valley extends all the way back to prehistoric times. In the Middle Ages the valley already had several large villages and manors.

Kiiala was already a rälssi säteri and residential manor in the Middle Ages. It was the home estate of the Stålarm family from the 14th to the 17th century. Born at Kiiala were, among others, the general and councillor of state C.J.Adlercreutz (1757-1815) and the artist Albert Edelfelt (1854-1905). The manor's two-storey, mansard-roofed main building, representing the Rococo style, was completed in 1796 during the time of General Carl Johan Adlercreutz. The building was remodelled in the Empire style in the first half of the 19th century and in the nikkari style in the 1880s. The spirits factory was founded by Carl Axel Lewin in the 1880s.

Suomenkylä had ten farms in the 1560s. It was among the smaller of the villages in the river valley.

Strömsberg is mentioned as a royal manor in 1413. Later the farm was a säteri, a crown office farm, and from the 1720s onwards a bishop's office farm. The main building of the manor was built during the time of Bishop Paul Krogius in the 1790s, and its original mansard roof was changed to a gable roof in the mid-19th century. A garden plan was completed in 1938.

In the neighbouring rapids there was probably a mill as early as the Middle Ages. The first mention of the mill dates from the 1570s. The mill was moved to its present site in 1919 in connection with the construction of a power station.