MIRKKU KULLBERG 

Mirkku Kullberg is the WHF ambassador for Finland and the CEO and founder of Glasshouse. Mirkku is a visionary leader and cross-disciplinary thinker for creative businesses. She is a design executive with a strong track-record in branding, re-structuring and urnaround processes and sustainable business models. As a thought leader and an inspiring advocate for Scandinavian design, Mirkku is a firm believer in future-oriented sustainability. 

Helsinki has seen a slew of successful design firms emerge in recent years. The latest testament to its potential as a design city is found on Helsinki’s main high street, Aleksanterinkatu. A historic art nouveau building is the site of the latest retail venture by Mirkku and her team. The former CEO of Finnish heritage furniture brand Artek relocated back to her native Finland from the US to take advantage of Helsinki’s opportunities. Glasshouse is a multi-storey space that includes a gallery and shop dedicated to sustainable design. Glasshouse has therefore already become an inspiring meeting place for designers, architects, artists, scientists and other businesses. “Helsinki is a city where you get things done,” she says. “There’s a certain sense of urgency in the way both the businesses and city officials approach things.”

@mirkku.kullberg @glasshousehelsinki

SASHA HUBER

Sasha Huber is a Helsinki-based, multidisciplinary visual artist-researcher of Swiss-Haitian heritage. Her work is primarily concerned with the politics of memory and belonging, particularly in relation to colonial residue left in the environment. Sensitive to the subtle threads connecting history and the present, she uses and responds to archival material within a layered creative practice that encompasses performance-based interventions, video, photography, and collaborations. Huber is also claiming the compressed-air staple gun, aware of its symbolic significance as a weapon while offering the potential to renegotiate unequal power dynamics and names these laborious artworks ‘pain-things’. She is known for her artistic research contribution to the "Demounting Louis Agassiz" campaign, aiming at dismantling the glaciologist’s lesser-known but contentious racist heritage. In 2021, Huber will start her first solo exhibition tour under the title “You Name It”. The tour begins at Kunstinstituut Melly in Rotterdam and continues to further institutions such as The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery in Toronto, Autograph in London, and Turku Art Museum in Finland. 

www.sashahuber.com

@sashahuber @kunstinstituutmelly @thepowerplantto / @autographabp @turkuartmuseum

NATHALIE LAUTENBACHER 

Franco-Finnish ceramicist and designer Nathalie Lautenbacher has been creating tableware collections renowned for their delicate colour, subtle form and strong personal touch since 1999. Each year brings new additions to the ceramics family, with each unique object diligently created by pouring coloured porcelain into a plaster mold.In recent years, Lautenbacher has not only created ceramics to be put on tables, but also on walls and floors. Besides functional items, she creates large pots, wall art and ceramic installations in collaboration with the designer Naoto Niidome. Ceramic is combined with other carefully selected materials, such as textile, aluminium, wood, or plaster. She has designed functional homeware for Arabia and Iittala and has also worked for the Japanese ceramics industry. As Lautenbacher says, “There’s something very satisfying and addictive about working with clay. The slowness of it makes time stop, but you still feel as if you’re keeping up with life. It’s a material that gives you a firm hold of the world.”

www.nathaliel.fi

@nathalielautenbacher

JOHANNA VUORIO

Johanna Vuorio is the CEO of Nikari, a design studio and furniture manufacturer advocating good, harmonious life with warm natural materials representing serene Nordic esthetics. Established in 1967, the company foundations rest upon the idea of working for bringing out the best of wood in contemporary design.  Nikari is continuously striving to improve and work dedicatedly on the things essential for a better future: real materials, sustainable manufacturing, authentic living.

Nikari sustainability programme consists of different areas. The high aesthetic and technical qualities ensure a centuries long lifecycle for the products. The company uses green energy in the manufacturing processes, and the raw material – wood - is sourced from certified forests. The product development process aims to optimise the material usage and minimise the amount of landfill waste. Nikari collaborates with global freight forwarders that compensate harmful emissions and continuously search for betterways to take care of the transportation. The company owns forest parks and protects primeval forests. Part of the sales profits is donated to the protection of global forests’ biodiversity.  

nikari.fi/journal

@nikarioy

Mikko-Pekka Hanski

Creating stories and building worlds with intuition and imagination, Mikko-Pekka once quoted, when he said 2020 goodbye to Idean, a company he co-founded 1999. Idean was the only thing in his CV but he could surely write a book of development, marketing, selling and surviving in the business jungles. A successful business innovator, educated teacher is on new journey, searching the hundred ideas of forest, all kind of ideas related to past and future, culture and work, immaterial and material ideas. Mikko-Pekka Hanski is an inspiring person, with true respect on everyday life and small things. Exciting to see, what he will find, when wandering in the forests.

SAMI TALLBERG

Awarded chef, wild herb pioneer and mushroom freak Sami Tallberg admits that his ikigai indeed is being the advocate of wild food. His 11 books and polymorphous events around  the globe, in 21 countries along with 21 years in catering business has all been devoted to the spirit of wild. Tallberg’s unique style is based on delicacy, nutrient density, respecting natures own micro seasons, insightful and environmental friendly approach with 100% possibility for biohacker proof menus.Sami’s guests will always have an experience with food that is based on nature around diners and that way feeling the human-nature-connection so that we humans are always one with surrounding nature, never above it. 

@samitallberg

TAINA SNELLMAN

Design helps. That is one way to describe the Finnish design company Tikau and its founder, TainaSnellan-Langenskiöld. Taina’s approach to design is to find solutions to social and environmental challenges. Another description would be that Tikau produces only beautiful, quality objects – since any other products would not be worth producing. “Sustainability was always the core mission for Tikau. Had I been a doctor, I would probably have founded a different company”, she says.

Tikau’s mission goes way beyond design. For years, Tikau’s products have been manufactured in small villages of India. Now it’s time to be more local. Taina has started a rug production close to her home in a small village in southern Finland, and the chosen material is as ethical as possible – Finnish sheep wool.

EIJA KOSKI 

Himmeli maker Eija Koski's childhood memories go back to her aunt's farmhouse in Finland's Northern Savo region, where a himmeli was always on display for Christmas. "I remember how I used to stare at the himmeli slowly swaying with the draft while the adults were just talking," says Koski. "I became enchanted by it!" Twenty years later Koski went to a course on how to make a himmeli. "At that moment I just knew that this was my thing!" Eventually she became a himmeli artist and she is currently fully dedicated to himmelis: She travels round the world teaching courses, she has shown her work in innumerable exhibitions and her first  book, Himmeli (published by Maahenki, 2012), is in its fifth printing. Her Himmeli books are published in five languages: English, Spanish, Japanese, Swedish and Finnish. According to Koski, the himmeli boom is part of the slow movement. "I think people are looking to reconnect with their heritage," she says. "Artisanal handicrafts are becoming more popular." Often the himmeli-making courses are attended by "urban-style youngsters, and not just women but also men.” Koski, who lives in a farm near Vaasa, on the west coast of Finland, uses only organic rye from her own field to make her himmelis. She selects and hand cuts her own rye straws. Even though himmelis seem quite geometrical and architectural, "it's easy to become addicted," she says. Many designers consider the himmeli more of a sculpture than an ornament.

TAUKO

TAUKO is a sustainable Nordic fashion house founded in 2014 and based in Helsinki, Finland. TAUKO is committed to creating timeless and ethical clothing for people who care about the planetary well-being. TAUKO believes in kindness, honesty and respect. The core of the fashion line is high-quality, used textiles, reworked for our collections, supporting local economies and minimising carbon footprints.

@taukodesign

VEERA KULJU

“Intense and easily inspired, curious and emotional – I admit to that. For me life is all about the opposites: darkness and light, fragility and strength, randomness and control. Aspiration to understand is my driving force as I’m searching for explanations. I find myself under water and up in a tree as I search for my own way of looking at the world. Considering myself as an eternal beginner makes me free from the rules and enables me to see flaws as a chance.” 

Veera Kulju is a Helsinki based artist and a designer who works mainly by sculpting clay. She is the founding member of so_helsinki collective. Her art is represented by Gallery Halmetoja in Helsinki and Gallery Hostler Burrows in New York. She has exhibited both in Finland and internationally. You can find her work in the collections of Swedish Nationalmuseum.

@veerakulju

WWW.VEERAKULJU.COM

MYSSYFARMI

The story of Myssy is a story of fire souls, who wanted to write a different kind of chapter, when thinking of fashion, who wanted to push the boundaries when talking about sustainability. The first Myssy was made by Janne, a professional windsurfer, who wanted to learn to knit a beanie. After surfing around the world, he returned to his home village, met his becoming wife Anna, designer, a true creative mind. Together they created a team, a family of grannies, who started knitting beanies and Myssy story was born.
Anna Rauhansuu is the creative director and CEO of Myssyfarmi, a farm-based design company from Pöytyä, Finland. Her family has been farming the river valley of Aurajoki since the 16th century. Before returning her home bounds, she had a career in branding and advertising. Her work is guided by cross-generational traditions and her love for rural lifestyle. For her nature is not just a source of inspiration, but of well-being and energy. She feels a strong sense of belonging and responsibility to Pöytyä as well as the desire to follow her ancestors, yet understands it is vital to remain connected to the urban culture. She is drawn to other bold characters who have found a way to make their farfetched dreams and outsized projects a reality - in essence, other outsiders. This is reflected in the Myssy designs, with a mix of the old and the new: retro styles, traditional techniques, and contemporary shapes. The visual world of Myssy is built out of the joyful juxtapositions of urban and rural lifestyles - their contradictions and their mixture, their contrasts and compliments. Whether in the city or in the countryside, a strong feeling of externality follows here - always feeling like an outsider.

WWW.MYSSYFARMI.FI

ORDBORD

Janne Salo studied at Yale University, where the liberal arts toured him from economics and political science to philosophy and art history. In his first semester, he read Dickinson, Whitman and Thoreau, enveloped by the autumn New England landscape they immortalised in poems. It sparked his love for written culture, and it spread. He inspired Jordi Rocha to abandon plans to study law and follow his love of stories instead. Studying literature at King’s College London and Oxford University, Jordi poured into Austen novels and dove into the archives of his literary heroes. Janne then encountered Sami Markkula, a designer-engineer, while studying industrial design together at Aalto University. Tired with chemical engineering, Sami put his material knowledge to use and innovated at the juncture between design, sustainability and culture. 

Today, an entire world of experience lies largely forgotten between the pages of closed books. Trailblazing voices like Emily Dickinson and Louisa May Alcott faced prejudice in their time, and for many today, their voices still go unheard. In 2020, Janne, Jordi, and Sami set out to make a change, gather their inspiring words, and raise them to the forefront of daily experience. They founded Ordbord, a sustainable jewellery brand that celebrates the words of iconic women in history and gives them a shining spot in everyday life. Their mission is to celebrate the writers, scientists, and political figures who often went unappreciated in their times. Their jewellery turns the wave and gives their words a shining spot in everyday life. The pieces are cast from recycled sterling silver in a fourth generation workshop in Finland. 

www.ordbord.com

@ordbordjewellery 

MATLEENA KALAJOKI

Matleena Kalajoki is the Sales and Marketing Manager for ONOMA Cooperative of Artists, Designers and Artisans in Fiskars. Originally a jewelry designer and a creative sales professional who came to Fiskars in 2016 to work for Onoma after living 10 years in London, Kalajoki was thrilled by what she discovered: "I was stunned by the density and diversity of talent in this small area, and the natural beauty. It is a wonderland. I can't think of a better place to fulfill ones’ creative urges.” Founded in the historical ironworks village in Raseborg in 1996, Onoma is the largest and oldest operating cooperative of artists in Finland. Onoma’s 140 members represent dozens of different fields of design, arts and crafts, and each of them either lives or works in Fiskars village.

Onoma’s most visible form of activity is organizing high quality summer exhibitions every year. Members also have their own store, ONOMA Shop, which is located in the heart of the village in the Clocktower Building. Fiskars AiR is an international artist residency that has operated under Onoma for 15 years. In their work the members of this exceptionally creative community implement the principles of sustainable development, living in harmony with the surrounding nature, significant industrial history and modern technological innovations. Sense of locality and community is strong. Fiskars Village has earned the first Green Destination status in Finland in 2019 (Communities & Culture category) and is included in the 2019 Global Top 100 Sustainable Destinations. In the summer of 2022 Onoma will produce the Fiskars Village Art & Design Biennale together with partners Luovi Productions, Fiskars Village and the city of Raseborg. During Christmas season 2021 Onoma will be participating in the Glasshouse Helsinki department store with works from more than 20 makers who work with wood, ceramics, glass, visual art, jewelry, textile, glass and much more!

@matleenak
@onomagram
@fiskars_village