Where to Stay in Espoo, Uusimaa

Espoo is known as the second city of Finland, a sprawling municipality of Uusimaa spread across southern Finland just west of the capital. The medieval Espoon tuomiokirkko stands at its old heart, the cathedral that gives the modern city a thread back to the parish of Espoon kaupunki. Old church, new city.

Visitors who come to Espoo find the farmstead of the Talomuseo Glims and the collections of the Helinä Rautavaaran museo and the Koulumuseo Lagstad, the museums that keep the long story of this corner of Uusimaa.

The Espoon tuomiokirkko is the landmark that anchors Espoo, the medieval stone cathedral that served the old parish of Espoon kaupunki long before the modern city of Uusimaa grew around it. The farmstead of the Talomuseo Glims keeps the rural past at the edge of southern Finland's second city. Old farm, old school.

The Helinä Rautavaaran museo holds collections gathered from far beyond Finland, the Koulumuseo Lagstad preserves an old schoolhouse, and the parish life of the Keski-Espoon Lähiseurakunta carries the church tradition of Espoo forward through the spreading districts of Uusimaa.

Espoo's history runs from a medieval country parish to the second city of Finland. The Espoon tuomiokirkko marks the beginning, the stone cathedral whose parish of Espoon kaupunki was set on its own footing in the 15th century, in 1458, when the church gathered the farms of this corner of Uusimaa under one roof. Farms came first.

For centuries the place was a scattered rural parish of southern Finland, its life turning on the fields and the manor estates, the kind of countryside the farmstead of the Talomuseo Glims still preserves in timber and tools. The modern city grew late and fast. Where farms had stood, the spreading suburbs and centres of greater Helsinki pushed west into Espoo through the last century, and the rural municipality of Uusimaa became a metropolis of many districts rather than one old town.

The museums tell the change. The Helinä Rautavaaran museo, the Koulumuseo Lagstad and the parish of the Keski-Espoon Lähiseurakunta keep the older threads as the city of Espoo went on growing across southern Finland into the country's second largest.

Espoo spreads across the coast and forest of Uusimaa, in southern Finland, immediately west of the capital. The municipality has no single centre but many, the districts strung out from the shore of the Gulf of Finland inland over wooded ridges and lakes toward the country beyond. Many centres, one city.

The old parish core gathers near the Espoon tuomiokirkko of Espoon kaupunki, the farmstead of the Talomuseo Glims keeps the rural northern edge, and the built districts of southern Finland's second city run on across the whole broad sweep of Espoo.

Espoo keeps the mild coastal weather of Uusimaa, its seasons tempered by the sea on the southern edge of Finland. Winters are cold but eased by the Gulf of Finland, the snow lying over the districts and the wooded ridges yet thinner here than in the cold interior of the country. Summers are long and light.

The northern daylight warms the coast and the forests of southern Finland through a generous season, the weather around Espoo gentler than inland Uusimaa, before the early grey of autumn settles over the city.

Espoo is easily reached, woven into the transport of greater Helsinki across Uusimaa. Trains, the metro and motorways run west from the capital into the districts of southern Finland's second city, and the airport of the metropolitan area lies a short way off. The city is well connected.

Buses and the rail network link the centres of Espoo to one another and to Helsinki, while visitors bound for the Espoon tuomiokirkko of Espoon kaupunki or the farmstead of the Talomuseo Glims ride out to the older corners of Uusimaa from the modern hubs.