We might study so much from the Finns, not simply from their intrinsic embrace of design as a part of on a regular basis life, however of their way of living full cease. You’ve most likely learn already that they’re frequently (maybe spuriously) voted the happiest inhabitants on the planet. Right here’s a mere smattering of outstanding information gleaned about life in Helsinki from simply two days spent overlaying Helsinki Design Week 2024 (6 to fifteen September). Throughout summer season holidays, on daily basis, all youngsters underneath the age of 16 have entry to free, state-funded, sizzling meals served in playgrounds at lunchtime. There’s a tunnel system underneath Helsinki with a plan to accommodate and assist your complete city inhabitants in case of disaster, full with water, electrical energy, wifi, libraries, playgrounds, an artwork gallery and sufficient meals provides for 3 years. Taxes could be exorbitant however state welfare is deemed adequate to not elicit a lot grumbling. Oh, and apparently Finns name mozzarella Moomin flesh, which is wonderful.
The twentieth version of Helsinki Design Week was themed ‘Beneath’
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
We’re right here to speak about design, not Moomins, and, true to Finnish design sensibility, Helsinki Design Week will not be an occasion that takes place solely at a commerce truthful. Over two days we’re proven Alvar Aalto buildings, in fact. However we’re additionally proven a brand new playground that teaches youngsters about digital tradition, a brand new four-storey lodge and HQ for the forestry firm Stora Enso, constructed predominantly from wooden, a brand new housing improvement by American architect Steven Holl, a brand new wood toy firm, and a brand new mixed analysis and exhibition house at Aalto college. We’re taken to new eating places and launched to a brand new architectural competitors for a brand new Museum of Design and Structure that’s spearheading the redevelopment of a brand new museum quarter on the previous harbourfront. We’re launched to the brand new artistic administrators of heritage Finnish design manufacturers. The message is loud and clear: there’s a surge of progress happening in Helsinki, and design is the driving force.
Meander is a brand new housing venture by Steven Holl, unveiled throughout Helsinki Design Week
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
For all of the optimism, not all the things is rosy in Helsinki. There are 50 per cent extra lodge rooms within the capital as we speak than in 2019 – an enormous variety of new properties had been greenlit earlier than the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and, due to the latter, tourism is struggling. Due to the warfare and crucial detour round Russian airspace, Vantaa’s monopoly as an Asian transit hub has all however dried up. That stunning paragon of an airport appears like a ghost city. Finland may now be a part of Nato, however its 1,340km border with Russia looms giant on the horizon and within the consciousness of Finns.
Helsinki’s south harbour is primed to develop into a brand new museum quarter over the following decade
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
At dinner one night time a director of the digital design company Reaktor (winners of this yr’s Helsinki Design Award) defined that the economic system is nimbly transitioning from manufacturing to know-how. But, such is the size of the nation, he stated, Finland can solely ever act as a laboratory for hatching glorious manufacturers that wealthier corporations elsewhere will purchase to catapult into a special worth league. This stayed with me as we took in design week and all its novelties. Economics apart, is being a design-driven laboratory for the remainder of the world such a rum deal? Not less than the Finns have happiness on their facet.
Helsinkidesignweek.com
A seductive marketing campaign picture from Iittala
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Highlights from Helsinki Design Week 2024
Designs for a Cooler Planet is in its sixth version on the Aalto College
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Aalto College
15-years in the past the enterprise, know-how and design universities in Helsinki merged to create the Aalto College, pioneering trans-sectoral training and analysis within the course of. A brand new constructing opened on the campus final week devoted to AI, augmented actuality, mind analysis, communication and staged occasions. It’s also dwelling to the sixth version of pupil work underneath the title ‘Design for a Cooler Planet’, on present for design week. These are greater than speculative tasks. In lots of instances, due to the collaborative nature of the Aalto academic method, attention-grabbing ideas are in a position to be prototyped and examined for viability at better scales. Right here we study textiles made out of banknotes taken out of circulation, different packaging options, pure dyes and shimmering sequins made completely from wooden. If Finland is the laboratory of the world, the Aalto College is the laboratory of the longer term.
Aalto.fi
New materials made out of decommissioned cotton-based banknotes – the murky hue is derived from the unique color of used banknotes. Analysis by: Inge Schlapp-Hackl, Herbert Sixta and Michael Hummel from Aalto.
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
‘Kaamos’ by Iittala at Kulttuuritalo
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Iittala
Within the purple brick depths of Kulttuuritalo, the Helsinki Corridor of Tradition (designed by Alvar Aalto and opened in 1958), Iittala staged a powerful, evocative showcase. Titled ‘Kaamos’, the present consisted of ten monumental glass sculptures within the blacked-out stomach of the constructing, lit by a round projection of the solar or the mouth of a furnace. Iittala’s new artistic director Janni Vepsäläinen has brought about a stir together with her dynamic dealing with of the heritage glass firm since her appointment final yr. Iittala resides within the properties and hearts of most Finns, so adjustments include nice duty and excessive stakes. From the place we stand, we applaud Vepsäläinen for reigniting ardour right into a model that has hearth at its coronary heart and alchemy in its soul, and it’s clear she cares deeply concerning the origins and the way forward for Iittala. ‘Kaamos’ stirred hearts and souls; capturing the basic ‘countless shades of twilight’ as summer season’s solar slowly loses its luminescence. ‘Glass doesn’t exist with out mild,’ Vepsäläinen stated casually on the opening, suggesting materials intelligence and a present for aphorism in a beat. The place so many long-cherished manufacturers in design at the moment are being run by cash males in gray fits, how thrilling it’s to have a youthful firebrand and enlightened artistic on the helm of Iittala.
Iittala.com
Restricted re-edition Alvar Aalto vases, first launched in 1937, had been additionally on present. The vases are made utilizing a neighborhood Finnish sand which provides them their greenish hue, with out the necessity for any oxides and compounds being added through the manufacturing course of to create the colored glass.
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Over at Helsinki’s Design Museum, a rigorous but mild exhibition FIX: Care and Restore serves a pertinent reminder than new will not be at all times finest
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Helsinki Design Museum
A merger earlier this yr between the Museum of Finnish Structure and the Design Museum in Helsinki heralded the decision for an nameless structure competitors to design a house for what might be on completion (slated for 2030) one of many world’s largest museums devoted to design and structure. In the identical location the place the ill-fated Guggenheim venture was as soon as meant to sit down, this extra rational venture is spear-heading the redevelopment of Helsinki’s South Harbour. In the meantime, a lightweight but rigorous present ‘FIX: Care and Restore’ is on on the design museum’s present abode, demonstrating the myriad methods through which attitudes to repairs influence our belongings, buildings and lives at giant.
Designmuseum.fi
FIX accommodates a room devoted to demystifying patina, put on and grime administration in numerous supplies
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
A spectacular commissioned work by Takao Momiyama, a Japanese grasp of the restore method Sashiko, hangs within the FIX exhibition at Helsinki’s Design Museum
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Pelata – a brand new launch over lunch by Finnish Design Store in collaboration with stars from the Nordic design firmament. Pelata is Finnish for ‘Let’s Play!’ (simply not together with your meals please…)
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Finnish Design Store
Celebrating their twentieth anniversary of ‘transport Nordic happiness all over the world’ to 170-odd nations, the Finnish retailer and distributor has marked the event by launching their first own-brand assortment. Known as ‘Pelata’ which suggests ‘Let’s Play’ in Finnish, the gathering includes a variety of wood objects designed for kids to take pleasure in and for adults to reawaken their inside youthfulness. Musical devices by Norwegian stars Anderssen &Voll, a backgammon board by TAF Studio, and throwing video games by Kaksikko and Studio Tolvanen had been launched over a selfmade seasonal banquet lunch within the previous practice yards. ‘Enjoying video games is likely one of the easiest but in addition strongest methods of participating with the world and one another,’ stated Teemu Kiiski, founding father of the Finnish Design Store: ‘Good design is about engagement, not simply taking a look at issues.’
Finnishdesignshop.com
The Finns take acoustics severely; Finnish firm Molina Acoustics exhibits the best way at Habitare
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Habitare
Commerce festivals have it robust in design lately. Away from the worldwide behemoth of Salone and the bigger regional occasions in Stockholm and extra not too long ago Copenhagen, Helsinki’s commerce truthful addresses the Finnish market. As such ‘information’ is pretty skinny on the bottom. Carl Hansen had been first-time exhibitors, having opened a showroom in Helsinki within the pandemic. Amongst previous favourites, highlights on their stand included stunning lighting from their 2023 acquisition of Danish Lighting producer Pandul. Elsewhere, acoustic and environmental lighting options demonstrated the Finns rigour with sensory wellbeing in design and structure. Winter is at all times coming on this a part of the world. What could possibly be a dry affair in Habitare is lifted considerably by the inclusion of youthful designers in a devoted part too. Ones to observe are Myceen, pushing the boundaries of Mycelium not only for product design, however as a constructing materials too. We had been additionally charmed by the younger expertise Teemu Vidgren’s interpretation of conventional Finnish vernacular objects from ‘peasant homes’ in his personal phrases, which included a standing candlestick and textile screen-cum-room divider.
Habitare.com
A reissued Hans Wegner pendant from Pandul, acquired by Carl Hansen final yr, was one in all our highlights from the fairground
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
A large mycelium lump drew curious stares within the fairground. It’s from MYCEEN, a younger studio producing furnishings and inside merchandise from mycelium, but in addition constructing supplies.
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Mild Cognitive’s synthetic sky panels mimic the hues of daylight and sky with a sequence of individually managed LED molecules so the impact is psychological, not simply aesthetic. Balenciaga has put in an enormous show in its latest New York flagship.
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Younger expertise Teemu Vidgren’s interpretation of conventional Finnish vernacular objects features a standing candlestick and textile screen-cum-room divider
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
The soon-to-open Ruoholati Playground takes youngsters contained in the world of computing, exterior
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Ruoholati Playground
The primary computer-themed playground on this planet is quickly to open, due to the mixed creativeness of youngsters’s creator Linda Liukas and the imaginative and prescient of Hanna Harris, Helsinki’s chief design officer. Helsinki is celebrating 110 years of public playgrounds this yr. There are at the moment 64 playgrounds in Helsinki and this remodelled one from the Nineteen Nineties is brilliantly weird. ‘The thought is to assist youngsters have interaction about laptop tradition by means of bodily motion,’ Liukas explains, ‘Studying by means of play is a strong approach of demystifying complicated topics and serving to to make individuals comfy with the unknown.’ Throughout totally different zones and brightly colored objects right here, youngsters are inspired to study concepts about keyboards and algorithms, coding and media security. ‘We hope to scale back the fear-factor of computing and assist make constructive reminiscences for kids rising up in a digital world,’ Liukas concludes. ‘Don’t neglect to play!’ wrote Alvar Aalto. He would little doubt approve of the Ruoholati Playground, and of Helsinki Design Week this yr too.
Hel.fi
Throughout totally different zones and brightly colored objects right here, youngsters are inspired to study concepts about keyboards and algorithms, coding and media security
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
‘Don’t neglect to play!’ Alvar Aalto
(Picture credit score: Hugo Macdonald)
Supply: Wallpaper
