Taalintehtaan historiallinen teollisuusalue (Dalsbruks historiska industriområde)

English translation (from the Finnish)

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Description

Taalintehdas, a compact and varied historic industrial area, has grown over more than three hundred years from a modest blast furnace into an extensive ironworks community. Taalintehdas belongs to the early ironworks of the Great Power era of the 17th century, and it forms part of the Länsi-Uusimaa ironworks chain, which is significant in industrial history. Alongside industrial, production and storage buildings of various periods, Taalintehdas has a number of workers' residential buildings and areas from the 18th century to the present day, as well as other public buildings of the community. Despite the growth of industry, the old ironworks environment with its slag brick buildings still forms the well-preserved historic and built-up core of the area. Taalintehdas's exceptionally long historical continuity is shown by the fact that it is the last of our old ironworks where an iron factory still operates.

The Taalintehdas ironworks on the southern shore of Kemiö Island was founded at a site excellent for transport connections. The industrial buildings form two separate groups. The old ironworks site lies along the stream that flows from Pieni Masuunilampi into the sea. Below the old stone dam, built of stone but partly renewed and reinforced, lie the ruins of a blast furnace built of grey stone and brick, and around it the foundations of the raastupa, the roasting kiln and the charcoal house. To the south of the blast furnace are a foundry built of slag brick and red brick, as well as a brick machine workshop and a screw and nut factory. The newer factory area, whose oldest parts date from the 1920s and which was built especially in the 1930s and 1970s, was established on Skeppsholmen island. Skeppsholmen is connected to the mainland by an embankment.

The residential buildings of workers and clerks form an exceptionally well-preserved, historically layered ensemble from the 18th century to the present day. The oldest log workers' dwellings of the 18th century at Taalintehdas are located on the southern slope of the so-called Norrbacken. A two-storey workers' barracks dates from the 1830s, and two barracks partly built of slag brick date from the end of the 19th century. Its own special building type is the two-storey luhtikäytävätalot of Taalintehdas, from the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. In the 1930s, many workers' residential buildings were built at Taalintehdas. Workers' housing from the first half of the 20th century is represented by the uniform chain of residential buildings at Nedre Sabbels.

On the seashore there are twelve charcoal kilns built of slag brick in the 1880s, and at the old quay there are an Empire-style stable, a grain storehouse and a storage building. The Taalintehdas church and school building, originally built as a Methodist church in 1921, are also of slag brick.

There are two ironworks manors at Taalintehdas. The older, from 1762, is located with its park on a slope descending to the shore. The second manor, completed in 1874, was renovated in 1936. The office building, which has housed clerks' flats, apparently dates back to the 18th century or the early 19th century. The Empire-style clerks' building dates from the mid-19th century.

History

The blast furnace privilege at Taalintehdas was granted in 1686. The ironworks' location was influenced by a sheltered harbour, good connections to Sweden and extensive forest resources. At first only a blast furnace was built on the site, and forging was carried out at the Kosken ironworks in Perniö. When Stockholm wholesale merchant Mikael Hising bought Taalintehdas in 1724, it became part of an ironworks chain that included the Billnäs, Fagervik and Skogby ironworks. The main ore for the ironworks came from Utö, and their products were sold in Sweden.

Ownership of Taalintehdas passed in 1834 to Carl August Ramsay and after him to Wolter Ramsay, who in 1860 received permission to establish a puddling and rolling mill. Taalintehdas had been formed as an independent company in 1856. During the ownership of the Swiss Jakob Stüntz, Finland's first Martin plant was built at Taalintehdas for casting steel. Taalintehdas became a joint-stock company in 1885, after which the factory was greatly expanded and became Finland's largest iron-making plant. The blast furnace was renewed in the 1890s. Alongside the blast furnaces, Taalintehdas had a rolling mill, foundry, chain factory, nail factory and steam sawmill. A new factory was built on the island of Skeppsholmen, which gradually developed into the industrial centre of Taalintehdas that still operates today.

Taalintehdas formed an independent community within the former municipality of Dragsfjärd. For a long time, Taalintehdas had wished for its own church. In 1897 the factory had two church boats built, with which people were transported to Dragsfjärd church. In 1934 Rautatehdas bought the church that the Methodist congregation had built in 1921-1922, and handed it over to the parish on condition that the parish take care of paying a priest's salary. The factory owned the land on which the community stood and was responsible for its planning and construction. After the Second World War, the factory's influence on the building of the community began to wane. In the 1970s the centre of the municipality moved to Taalintehdas, and the municipality became a key planner and builder. The new administration building was completed in 1975. Dragsfjärd joined the new Kemiönsaari large municipality through a municipal merger in 2009.