Finnvasion at DMY Berlin

Three months in to this project and we finally get to design in the traditional sense of the word. I spent last week in Berlin at the DMY festival. The festival was very much like Berlin itself - young, experimental and unconventional. They had a finnish focus this year which resulted in a mass invasion of finnish design and designers. I am only able to scratch the my surface here in my official report.

The festival took place for the second time at Tempelhof, the famous ex-airport, and may I just take a moment to say how jealous I am of this space. Huge, empty, beautifully lit space practically in the middle of the city. Maybe we could dismantle a hall and ship it to Helsinki.

First up: Jesse Pietilä seen through his Sheer Wall. Because we promised "design, tips & secrets" up there in the header, I will now tell you a secret. Jesse is actually not Jesse, he's Markku. I only know that because when he was applying to study at the University of Art and Design in Helsinki, I was the student monitoring the entrance exams and I took notice of him because he was consistently getting the highest points.

Salakauppa (Secret shop) is a super nice project, and a real shop run by Aamu Song and Johan Olin. They have scouted around Finland and Korea for small companies making great products and have done collaborations with these companies. Here an icelandic designer with very stylish stockings is modeling their latest design - a two heeled shoe.

Honorary Finn Jakob Schenk was showing his diploma project from the University of Art and Design (It's really called Aalto University nowadays but I have difficulty adapting). It's called Ticks and it's a pair of "table clips" with which you can turn any piece of board into a table. So clever, and that's why it's going to be a part of Protoshop in September.

Another honorary Finn Satoshi Yoshida and his equally clever book shelf. It's very narrow, only about half the depth of a normal book shelf because of the angled partitions.

Päivi Raivio and Veera Kulju make these wonderfully dark textiles out of discarded leather coats. Here Veera is cutting the leather bits into smaller strips. I got to try as well and it was quite therapeutic - they should sell a kit where the finishing is done by the buyer.

Pinch by Mikko Koskinen and Miko Laakso is a lighting element where the clips become small spotlights for photos or messages when attached to the rail.

Mikko Laakkonen and Klaus Aalto have similar taste in shoes (secret number 2).

I also had an own satellite exhibition in Berlin with the above mentioned Klaus Aalto but believe it or not - took not a single photo (zero). I even gave a talk at DMY underlining the importance of remembering to document everything well but failed to take notice myself. However, some photos and even words can be found here courtesy of Minimum blog.