Basics of Finnish design

Basics of Finnish design

There are two simple things to remember about Scandinavian design: There are a lot of Finnish designer who stay for simple but amazing design. The Scandinavians designers use to say: “Buy something and keep it forever.”

Alvar Aalto is a well-known Finnish architect and designer. Aalto means wave in English. He loved to create wavy things.  Alvar designed Finnlandia house in Helsinki which is located next to the train station. He loved constructions in the color white. They have to repaint the buildings in white a lot. Alvar Aalto also designed all the furniture and glassworks like lamps which were inside of his constructions.

In Helsinki there is also a stone church. It is famous for the acoustic and light. It is built into a hill. The light is changing every time, it depends on the daytime as well as season. It's worth it for a visit for sure.

Eroa Saarinen designed the Flight Center in NYC. Nowadays, inside of it is a luxury hotel. Furthermore, he designed Gateway Arch which is located in St Louis. You can reach the top of it with an elevator. 

The library in Tampere was designed by Reima Pietilä. It is a very special building because it doesn’t have any corners. I already visited this library but in my opinion it wasn’t that special.

Armi Ratia was the founder and manager of Marimekko. She was a very clever business lady and a very famous person in Finland. She is also well-known in Japan. A fun fact is that the airplane which fly from Finland to Japan has also the brands’ famous flowers on it.

The brands’ idea was to bring brightness and equality to the world. After the war everything was dark. With those colorful flowers on the designs she wanted to change it. Also, the equality was very important to her. Marimekko’s cloths are designed for everybody. It doesn’t differ the gender.

Oiva Toikka is famous for his birds made of glass. Those birds are quite expensive and getting even more expensive because Oiva Toikka won’t be able to do new hand-blown birds because he passed away last year. He told his secret how to make these birds just 10 glass blowers in the world. That’s the reason why the market of his glass birds is so small. I’ve also learnt that glass is made of sand. It is quite hard to find sand in those colors he made those birds.

I like Tapio Wirkkala. He is the designer of the old currency of Finland as well of a vodka bottle. Money and Vodka are very important to mostly everyone. He designed an everyday bottle which suits in your pocket. 

Fiskars is a small town not far away of Turku. This brand is producing orange scissors. The shape of handle is perfect made for everyone. The story behind the color was that they just had orange plastic in their factory. Furthermore, it was so easy to find it in a store because of their bright color. 

Angry birds were lanced by Rovio. Those birds were designed by Jako Isolo. 

Tove Jansson draw the Moomins. Some people think she was Swedish but actually she was Finnish. Tove also draw oil paintings and did other works but everyone is just remembering her about the Moomin.

Timo Sarpaneva designed famous Glöög glasses with the waste of zips. It is a very good and also ecological idea.