Suomenlinna Church

Suomenlinna Church was built in 1854, architects K. A. Thon, E. Sjöström, J. Eklund and V. Leistén. The church was built as an Eastern Orthodox garrison church for the Russian troops stationed at the Suomenlinna sea fortress, and was dedicated to Aleksander Nevski. In 1918 the Orthodox church was converted into an Evangelical Lutheran church, as Finland sought to indicate its new-found independence from Russia.

An interesting feature from the renovation is that the church’s central dome has doubled as a lighthouse since 1929, making it one of only a few churches in the world that has that dual purpose. The lighthouse is officially the Harmaja Range Rear light, and it pairs with the Harmaja lighthouse (4.8 km south in the Gulf of Finland) as the Range Front light. The signal blink is the Morse code for the letter “H” for Helsinki.