An overview of OK Talk and HEL YES! pop-up restaurant.

Making Places

The first event brought together six creative practitioners – Åbäke, design practice; Nene Tsuboi, designer and artist; Sarah Ichioka, director of Architecture Foundation; Teemu Suviala, co-founder of Kokoro & Moi; Tuomas Toivonen, musician and co-founder of NOW for Architecture and Urbanism and Finn Williams, urban planner and founder of Common Office – as well as an audience of fifty people.

Using different disciplines and projects, as well as the cities of London and Helsinki, as starting points, the discussion focused on the creation, evolution and essence of places. The panelists, having experience in making places through graphic identities, public saunas, events or urban planning, talked about utopian ideas and practical solutions, participatory spatial practices as well as the role and significance of localism and globalism, or planning and spontaneity, in their activities.

The gathering was complemented by Antto Melasniemi’s mushroom brunch, and it also included the London launch of Tuomas Toivonen’s Urbanism in the House album that continued on a boat ride in the canal, and was celebrated by listening to the record in the Islington Tunnel.

Nene Tsuboi, Benjamin Reichen, Sarah Ichioka, Teemu Suviala, Tuomas Toivonen, Finn Williams and Jenna Sutela.

Anni Puolakka, Nene Tsuboi, Benjamin Reichen and Sarah Ichioka.

Tuomas Toivonen and Finn Williams.

Teemu Suviala, Sarah Ichioka and Nene Tsuboi.

Antto Melasniemi, the chef of HEL YES!, and breakfast.

Urbanism in the House by Tuomas Toivonen.

Strategies of Participation

On Thursday 23rd, five speakers – Céline Condorelli, architect and founder of Support Structures; Ulla-Maaria Engeström, founder of Thinglink; HyperMarketo, communication platform; Karen Mirza, artist and founder of no.w.here and Suvi Saloniemi, curator at Kunsthalle Helsinki – and a small audience came together for a discussion about Strategies of Participation. Using tools such as an off-schedule (inspired by Brutally Early Club) and a potluck breakfast to which all the OK Talk visitors brought their favourite ingredients, we aimed to create an intimate atmosphere for sharing thoughts about encounters, interactions and collaborations.

The discussion evolved around topics such as spatial, cultural, psychological and communicative support for participation, self-production, online markets and communities as well as the concept of ‘non-participation’. Looking at strategies of participation from the perspectives of art, interaction design as well as cultural production of events and exhibitions, we also talked about the meaning of institutions, alternative cultures and friends in participatory projects.

The potluck breakfast, coordinated and cooked together by Antto Melasniemi, ended up including everything from fried British portobellos to Finnish crispbread.

Céline Condorelli, Ulla-Maaria Engeström, Jerome Rigaud, Karen Mirza, Suvi Saloniemi, Anni Puolakka and Jenna Sutela.

Céline Condorelli and Ulla-Maaria Engeström.

Jerome Rigaud, Karen Mirza and Suvi Saloniemi.

A potluck breakfast.

Audience at the OK Talk on Strategies of Participation.

Borderlands

The third OK Talk London dealt with the borderlands between different disciplines and featured five speakers – Revital Cohen, designer; Martti Kalliala, architect and one half of Renaissance Man; Zak Kyes, graphic designer and founder of Z.A.K.; Max Lamb, designer and Aamu Song, designer and founder of Company – and a record-breaking audience of nearly one hundred people.

The discussion revolved around the blurring of boundaries between design, art and other fields with an emphasis on collaborative practices. It explored the role and characteristics of a designer in an increasingly interconnected world where the ambiguity of professional identity, often connected with varied locations, people and modes of practice, was, in many ways, seen as an asset. The panelists also looked at the idea of designers creating their own economies, the culturally varying ideas of the concept of design (in Chinese, the word for design literally means ‘dream-shaping’) as well as the relationships between architecture and music, or design and science.

A salmon and potato breakfast was served by the HEL YES! restaurant.

Revital Cohen, Martti Kalliala, Zak Kyes, Max Lamb and Aamu Song.

Revital Cohen, Martti Kalliala and Zak Kyes.

Max Lamb and Aamu Song.

OK Talk London tabloid and a salmon and potato breakfast by HEL YES!.

Audience at the OK Talk on Borderlands.

OK Do thanks all the OK Talk participants, it was good!

The series of events consists of four brunch discussions, one in Helsinki and three in London, dealing with a total of three topics – Making Places, Strategies of Participation and Borderlands – exploring social, cultural and ethical viewpoints around different applications of design. Twenty designers and artists have been invited to attend the OK Talk sessions, each consisting of a panel discussion informed by a brief presentation of list-making and cross-question tasks given to the participants before the event and featured in a tabloid publication.
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Registration

R.S.V.P. at hello@ok-do.eu

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Programme

OK Talk Helsinki

Making Places

Saturday 4 September at ONNI home shop, Kulmakatu 5 A 4, Helsinki
Breakfast and discussion 11:30-13:30

Bryan Boyer, Architect and Design Lead / Sitra, www.helsinkidesignlab.org
Hanna Harris, Urban Researcher and Programme Director, Arts & Culture / The Finnish Institute in London, www.finnish-institute.org.uk
Amanda Levete, Architect / Amanda Levete Architects, www.amandalevetearchitects.com
Markus Miessen, Architect / Studio Miessen, www.studiomiessen.com – CANCELLED DUE TO ILLNESS – replaced by Shohei Shigematsu, Architect / OMA NY, http://oma.eu!
Nene Tsuboi, Artist and Designer / NOW for Architecture and Urbanism, www.nenetsuboi.com

Ticket: a breakfast ingredient specified in an e-mail following registration

Download the OK Talk Helsinki tabloid

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OK Talk London

Making Places

Saturday 18 September at HEL YES!, Wenlock Road 1-3, London
Breakfast and discussion 11:30-13:30

Åbäke, Design Practice, http://a.b.a.k.e.free.fr with Nene Tsuboi, Artist and Designer, www.nenetsuboi.com
Sarah Ichioka, Director / Architecture Foundation, www.architecturefoundation.org.uk
Teemu Suviala, Designer / Kokoro & Moi, www.kokoromoi.com
Tuomas Toivonen, Architect and Musician / NOW for Architecture and Urbanism, www.nowoffice.org
Finn Williams, Architect / Common Office,  www.commonoffice.co.uk

Free entry. HEL YES! restaurant open for breakfast orders.

The registration for the event ends on Thursday 16 Sept at 12am.

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Strategies of Participation

Thursday 23 September at HEL YES!, Wenlock Road 1-3, London
Breakfast and discussion 8:30-10:30

Celine Condorelli, Architect and Artist / Support Structure, www.celinecondorelli.eu
Ulla-Maaria Engeström, Design Researcher / Thinglink, http://ullamaaria.typepad.com
HyperMarketo, Design Practice, http://hypermarketo.com
Karen Mirza, Artist and Researcher / Mirza/Butler, http://mirza-butler.net
Suvi Saloniemi, Curator / Kunsthalle Helsinki, www.taidehalli.fi

With special breakfast by Antto Melasniemi, Restaurateur and Hospitality Entrepreneur, www.kuurna.fi.

Ticket: any breakfast ingredients worth around £8

The registration for the event ends on Tuesday 21 Sept at 12am.

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Borderlands

Saturday 25 September at HEL YES!, Wenlock Road 1-3, London
Breakfast and discussion 11:30-13:30

Revital Cohen, Designer, www.revitalcohen.com
Martti Kalliala, Architect and Musician / Renaissance Man, www.marttikalliala.com
Zak Kyes, Graphic Designer / Z.A.K. Studio, www.zak.to
Max Lamb, Designer, www.maxlamb.org
Aamu Song, Designer / Company, www.com-pa-ny.com

Free entry. HEL YES! restaurant open for breakfast orders.

The registration for the event ends on Thursday 23 Sept at 12am.

Download the OK Talk London tabloid

OK Talk Helsinki tabloids. Photo courtesy of Paavo Lehtonen.

Topics

Making Places

Making Places takes a fresh view on spatial practice. It studies both existing and imaginary places, looking at their creation, evolution and essence. The speakers for the two Making Places talks, one in Helsinki and another one in London, range from architects that build, design systems or make music to researchers and designers who create places through cultural activities or visual identities. Using Helsinki and London as starting points, we will encourage the discussion to revolve freely around placemaking in relation to day and night, the natural and the human-made, infrastructure and spirit of spaces, cities and citizens, or planning and spontaneity.

Strategies of Participation

Strategies of Participation explores the design of encounters, interactions and collaborations. Having used tools and methods such as intuition, friends, different media, travelling, coffee and the paper that you are holding in making OK Talk, we are keen on learning new ways to design participation. The panelists include creative professionals in the fields of interaction design and cultural production specialised in events, online platforms or exhibitions. They are invited to share their skills and insights on creating constructive collisions between people.

Borderlands

Borderlands explores the crossing of boundaries between design, art and other fields with an emphasis on collaborative practices. The idea of this talk is to look at the role of the designer in the increasingly interconnected world where we see the ambiguity of professional identity, often connected with varied locations, people and modes of practice, as an asset. What can working in between disciplines offer for creative professionals and the world at large? How are design processes changing? The speakers will tackle these questions through their backgrounds that vary from architecture and music to critical and experimental design, publishing and curating.

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Curated by us, the OK Talk events are produced in collaboration with the Finnish Institute in London, Helsinki Design Week and the British Council’s Creative Cities project. They are funded by the Ministry of Education in Finland. Art direction by Åh.

According to Antto Melasniemi’s plan, instead of an entrance ticket, the participants were asked to bring a breakfast ingredient each. Tuula Pöyhönen’s home was a perfect backdrop for making breakfast and enjoying the discussion.

Taking a fresh view on spatial practice, the discussion looked at the creation, evolution and essence of places. Using Helsinki and London as starting points, it revolved freely around placemaking in relation to cities and citizens, planning and spontaneity, as well as infrastructure and spirit of spaces. It will be documented in a publication following the series of events in Helsinki and London.

Shohei Shigematsu and Nene Tsuboi

Hanna Harris, Amanda Levete, Shohei Shigematsu and Nene Tsuboi

Bryan Boyer

See you at OK Talk London on 18, 23 and 25 September at HEL YES!, Wenlock Road 1-3 as Part of London Design Festival! The OK Talk London tabloid will be out on Friday, 10 September.

Photo courtesy of Hertta Kiiski.

The project started in May 2010 with a Saturday brunch discussion at Sitra. We invited around ten Helsinki-based people from different fields to imagine a more interesting and enjoyable city and ended up with a bunch of ideas.

Dreaming up life-improving initiatives for Helsinki. Photo courtesy of Kaarle Hurtig.

After the workshop, we started taking the ideas forward, consulting experts and compiling our strategic design proposals into a set of concrete examples; some easily applicable and some crazier Clues to Open Helsinki. The team was also joined by illustrator Nene Tsuboi and graphic designer Anna Mikkola. In the end, we presented the ideas in the form of 17 + 1 postcards from the future.

Photos courtesy of Hertta Kiiski.

Here’s a couple of examples picked up from the set of postcards from Helsinki 2012:

A City of All Shapes and Sizes

In 2012, the city is built from the bottom up. There is more variation in the urban pattern: townhouses, bigger complexes, new and old buildings next to each other. Communal housing is becoming popular and people combine living and working under the same roof. A lotting system is introduced to distribute the urban spaces for different organisations.

Katu Mayors

In 2012, Katu (‘street’ in Finnish) Mayors live in the neighbourhood and are elected by their peers. They participate in city-level planning relevant to the area and ensure that the residents and local businesses are heard, breathing diversity into the city. These local trustees are supported by grants and permits which allow them to manage the environment, services and facilities.

Winter Holidays

In 2012, the unique seasonal circumstances of Helsinki are cherished through moving part of the holiday from summer to winter. Today, people stay in the city for most of the summer, making it more active, enjoyable as well as attractive for tourists. The value in cold and short Helsinki days will be discovered through encouraging interaction between people in the winter, too.

Urbane Industry

Few places have a craft legacy as strong as Finland. In 2012 the local talents have been saved from the brink of extinction through programmes to encourage and foster small scale industry in the heart of the city. Multicultural skills merge in the new collaborations between designers and manufacturers working closely together.

Finally, we organised a party on the occasion of the postcards from the future. Held at the Palm House of Kaisaniemi Botanic Garden, referenced in the set of clues as a living room in the city that could be used more actively, the event also featured super raw chocolate smoothies and music by the Katu Mayor of our choice Timo Kaukolampi.

Photos courtesy of Hertta Kiiski.

Please find more information as well as the rest of the clues at www.cluestoopenhelsinki.fi.

Sound garden

In Helsinki, courtyards are often reserved for household activities, like garbage disposal or carpet beating. Other than that, they are mostly used for passing through. There are sounds that big bins make when they open and close, and the clatter of steps when people walk home. But were the inner yards featuring more gardens, tables and chairs – places to meet and hang around in – there might be a hum of longer and shorter conversations, jingling of cutlery and plates, and sounds that gardening creates.

Avian melodies

Some clichés are true: birds’ singing makes most people happy. And if Finnish people love nature, why not bring more of it to the city? If Helsinki would have more trees and small parks everywhere, there would also be more rustle of leaves, and birdsongs of different kinds.

Concrete music

How to make the most out of asphalt, the dominant flooring material of the city? We would like to hear more click-clacking of high-heeled shoes, tapping of the canes of older people taking the streets, rattle of skateboards and, naturally, the sound of bicycles skidding and braking.

World mix

With Finnish and Swedish as the official languages, Helsinki is already a bilingual city and other languages, like Russian, are heard more often everyday. Bringing more ingredients to the mix and creating a babel of languages along with their accents, dialects, volumes, rhythms and intonations, would make Helsinki sound more interesting.

Napa Gallery, Jani, Lotta and Martti.

Science Poems mini exhibition and Anni.

Books, Maija and Stella.

Paris photos and herbal drinks.

Jenna making drinks.

Benjamin and the party on the street.

Nene listening to DNA Junk by Martti Kalliala. On the left: Faraday Suit vest by K.I. Kinnunen. On the right: Higgs Boson by Anna Ahonen and Katariina Lamberg.

Kaira looking at Brain Forest by Nene Tsuboi.

Nene, a Science Poems artist and typographer for the Helsinki party.

Order Science Poems online through Napa webshop.

Astronomy
Anna Ahonen and Katariina Lamberg – Higgs Boson, 2010, Digital print

Anna Ahonen & Katariina Lamberg: Higgs Boson (2010), digital print, 80x120cm

Higgs boson is a hypothetical elementary particle predicted to exist by the Standard Model in particle physics. Experimental detection of the Higgs boson would help to explain the origin of mass in the universe. It is currently searched using the particle accelerators of CERN but it has yet to be observed in the physical world. If the Higgs boson cannot be found to exist, the current cosmological and physical models must be radically reassessed – and our conception of reality will change.

“The idea is to give attention to a phenomenon we find fascinating, to convey its mysticism to others,” Anna Ahonen and Katariina Lamberg explain. “Natural sciences encompass many intriguing and beautiful things that usually remain within books and the dedicatees. We, however, didn’t want to make a scientific or theoretical representation of a scientific thing, but rather use the facts as a starting point for a work of imagination.”

Anna Ahonen (b. 1981) and Katariina Lamberg (b. 1977) form a multidisciplinary design studio Ahonen & Lamberg founded in Paris, 2006. They are also co-founders and art directors of the Dossier Journal.

Biology
Nene Tsuboi – Brain Drawings, 2010, Ink and pencil on paper

Nene Tsuboi: Synapse (2010), ink on paper, 40 x 30 cm

The altogether six brain drawings – Brain Forest, Miracle of Brain, Dopaminergic, Neuron, Synapse and Dopamine – explore the scientific aspect of human feelings, experiences and perceptions. They were inspired by the love stories of a Japanese writer Shungicu Uchida that Nene Tsuboi has been working with.

“I wasn’t so much into science at school, but when I read an essay written by a Japanese brain scientist Ken Mogi some years ago, I became a big fan of brains,” Nene Tsuboi says. “I like the way he crosses over the borders of art, science, philosophy and religion in his books, radio shows and blogs. What intrigues me the most about brains is that we don’t know that much about them yet,” Nene Tsuboi says. “Everybody has one but they still haven’t been totally understood by anybody.”

Nene Tsuboi (b. 1976) is a Japanese graphic designer and artist living in Helsinki since 1999. She started her work as an illustrator with ANTEEKSI design collective in 2001, and later founded NOW architecture and design office with architect Tuomas Toivonen.

Chemistry
Martti Kalliala – DNA Junk, 2010, Audio

Martti Kalliala: DNA Junk (2010), audio 33 min.

DNA Junk is a base pair sequence of non-genomic DNA translated into notes through MIDI and played by a Roland TB-303 bass synthesiser. DNA – the storage for genetic information in all living things – consists of adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine (A, T, G, and C) molecules. The sequences of these four bases, A, T, G, and C, determine how you differ from other living things. So, for instance, the raw data needed to construct a particular human being is a 3 billion character long sequence of these four letters. If this is translated into notes as such, it produces a near infinite monophonic melody with seemingly little variation.

“It’s been known since the early 1980s that the construction of DNA and musical composition bear similarities in their repetition processes,” Martti Kalliala explains. “However, I thought it would be interesting to bring the concept into my ‘home’ domain of techno/house/electronic dance music, and make something that’s actually meaningful in this context – not only conceptually but musically too.”

Martti Kalliala (b. 1980) is an independent architect and musician who is currently touring the world with his electronic music project Renaissance Man. Having worked amongst others with the Office for Metropolitan Architecture and NOW, he is also editing a publication on twelve pragmatic utopias for Finland.

Earth Sciences
Miska Knapek – Windtracing, 2009, Real time digital visualisation

Miska Knapek: Windtracing (2009), a real time visualisation on a computer screen

The animation draws the story of the wind’s movement, taking place in Helsinki over one year. It narrates the hidden life of the wind with a pencil-thin grey line moving in the same direction and with proportionally similar velocity as the current of air. The larger line on the screen shows a close-up revealing the wind’s more intimate movements.

“There’s a slight existentialist moment in the process of working with real-time data – even if you make rules for how the data is going to be shown, you never know what you’re going to get,” Miska Knapek says. “You could say that I got into meteorology through seeing what the wind data does: how temperamental the wind can be, how different seasons affect it, and so on. The stereotypical idea of the wind is that it either blows or it doesn’t, and that it’s this static, lifeless thing that goes in one direction at a time. But when I got the Windtracing running, I saw a movement that reminded me of a dancer. I had to sit down for an hour or so to only watch it go.”

Miska Knapek (b. 1975) is a Danish interaction designer and artist living and working in Helsinki. Growing up by the sea, wind has always been a part of his life. Miska’s spatio-temporal work opens new windows to the world.

Physics
K.I. Kinnunen – Faraday Suit, 2010, Clothing of copper silk plain weave, silk metal organza, boiled metal wool, carbon net, etc.

K.I. Kinnunen: Faraday Suit (2010), copper silk mix (vest) and ESD protective cotton with carbon fibre jersey mix (multi-purpose garment). Photo courtesy of Justus Järnefelt.

Faraday Suit is a series of clothing bridging technoromanticism and retreat. Exploring the invisible electromagnetic environment it resonates with everyday life through pieces functioning as interfaces between the built electrosphere and our internal world.

“The design for the series came about through exploring electromagnetism, electromagnetic spaces and wearables in those spaces,” K.I. Kinnunen describes. “I also looked into conducting materials like carbon and metal fibres as well as intact and layered surfaces. I like to call the end result a wearable tale, or functional fiction in the spirit of Anthony Dunne and Fiona Raby’s thinking (see OK Do’s interview with Dunne & Raby). This is because Faraday Suit plays with the idea of functional fashion design by inventing new motives of use through creating, for example, natural spaces with association to insulation from the electromagnetic environment.”

K.I. Kinnunen (b. 1984) is a fashion designer based in Helsinki. Having graduated as Master of Arts from the School of Art and Design at the Aalto University early this summer, Kinnunen spent last spring working with Haider Ackermann in Antwerp. At the moment, she is designing mini-collections for her portfolio as well as made-by-order pieces for private clients.

Cross-disciplines
Kaarle Hurtig and Simo Vassinen – Welcome to Parasite, 2010, Photography and text

Kaarle Hurtig & Simo Vassinen: Welcome to Parasite (2010), photography and text

by sherabbi, Nov 20, 2009 12:00AM (5 member comments)
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[Our] modern Marco Polos now bring back the moral spices of which our society feels an increasing need as it is conscious of sinking further into boredom, but that this time they take the form of photographs, books, and travellers’ tales. (…) The perfumes of the tropics and the pristine freshness of human beings have been corrupted by a busyness with dubious implications, which mortifies our desires and dooms us to acquire only contaminated memories. (C. Lévi-Strauss: Tristes Tropiques)
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Welcome to Parasite investigates parasitology through anthropology and a metaphor of a paradise lost. “People travel across the seas in search of themselves, for realness and for belonging,” Kaarle Hurtig and Simo Vassinen say. “Every now and then, a parasite follows us home. There’s a microscopic worm that eats our insides, reminding us of false dreams and vanity, and leaving an emptiness that’s hard to shake off. But we would still rather stay inquisitive than stop. Claude Lévi-Strauss talked about the “sadness of the tropics” and the disenchanting side of exploration. Thor Heyerdahl’s eagerness was naive at times, and Paul Gauguin’s Tahiti was romanticised and corrupt. Our work is about this battle of curiousity, amazement and melancholy.”

Science Poems artists: Anna Ahonen & Katariina Lamberg (portrait by Spela Kasal), Nene Tsuboi (portrait by Hertta Kiiski), Martti Kalliala (portrait by Paavo Lehtonen), K.I.Kinnunen, Miska Knapek and Simo Vassinen & Kaarle Hurtig (portraits by H. Kiiski).

The full length interviews with the artists are included in the Science Poems book along with various other poetic writings and images about science by OK Do and friends. The book, designed by Åh, is available online at Napa Bookshop as well as at the 0fr bookshop, La Librairie du Palais de Tokyo, Librairie Flammarion at the Centre Pompidou and Yvon Lambert in Paris; AA Bookshop, Koenig Books at the Serpentine Gallery, Artwords Bookshop Hackney and b store in London; Kiasma (Mannerheiminaukio 2) and Napa Gallery (Eerikinkatu 18) in Helsinki; do you read me?! (Auguststrasse 28), Pro qm (Almstadtstrasse 48-50) and Motto (Skalitzer Str. 68) in Berlin as well as NEW ACCIDENT (233-1 Jyouhoku) in Komatsu, Ishikawa.

The Snowball project aimed to bring together Finnish and Chinese architecture through two events: one in Kiasma, Helsinki on February 12 and the other in Shanghai on March 25-27, 2010.

The events promoted Sino-Finnish architectural exchange. Tailored for Finnish architects wanting to collaborate with Chinese clients and colleagues, they presented an insight into contemporary opportunities, challenges and ambitions in China and provided the possibility for Finnish architects to present their work to local practitioners.

Snowball Shanghai programme booklet asks what can Finnish and Chinese architects learn from each other.

OK Do edited a programme leaflet for the Snowball Helsinki event as well as a booklet for Snowball Shanghai including articles about the purpose and background of the event as well as a short introduction to the Chinese and Finnish participants.

We also commissioned the design of the event material from Åh who left off with the idea of a snowball effect – a process that builds upon itself, forming a virtuous circle – apt for the series of events bringing together thinking and doing from two cultures. The blue ink snowball grows in size starting from an advertisement and a programme leaflet for Snowball Helsinki and reaching its peak in a programme booklet for Snowball Shanghai.

Marina, Esther and Florence on the construction site of a multicultural kitchen in Kalasatama.

Helsinki inhabits tens of thousands of immigrants who have all brought their memories, habits and delicacies with them. However, for some reason, this barely shows in the cityscape. Ahmet Aslan, the owner of the only Kurdish restaurant in Helsinki, Café Caisa, explains how difficult it is for a foreigner to open a decent eatery in the city. “Already when I came to Finland in the nineties, I wanted to open an à la carte restaurant serving food from my home country,” Ahmet says. “However, I didn’t have a Finnish education at that point, so I wasn’t able to get a license for serving wine – so, I ended up opening a lunch place first. When I finally received a local diploma, I returned to my original plans and put up a proper Kurdish à la carte restaurant in Kaisaniemi.” Café Caisa serves oriental home food including meze plates and fresh salads. “On the side, I also try to provide the customers with some insights to Kurdish culture,” Ahmet adds. He hopes that the Finnish government would learn from the likes of France and give more support to entrepreneurship within the restaurant industry. “This way, we might soon be known for our rich food culture, too,” he notes.

“It’s difficult for a foreigner to open a decent eatery in Helsinki.”

Opening an ethnic kitchen in Helsinki wasn’t easy for half Israeli and half Ukrainian Alexander Bitsak, either. Alexander moved to Finland a couple of years ago because he considered the country, in his own words, the best place in the world. He found a perfect space on Kustaankatu in Kallio for his Ukrainian pelmeni restaurant but, coming from Israeli at the time, was denied entrance to the country by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “So, I left my beautiful space, went to Kiova, and decided to try again,” Alexander explains. “Finally, I returned to Kustaankatu with a Ukrainian passport. Then, I renovated my restaurant and tried to make it special for customers and Finnish friends.” Alexander used to have a pizza place in Israel, but didn’t want to found one in Finland as he believes we have enough pizza already. “As a matter of fact, in addition to Ukrainian food like pelmenis and soups, my menu consists of traditional Finnish delicacies such as Karelian roast (karjalanpaisti) and Finnish fish pasty (kalakukko). It is easy to feel at home at Pelmenit, Alexander’s restaurant – and not just because of the familiar food. “The customers don’t come here only to eat, but rather to meet me,” Alexander says. “I ask how they are, how their family and health is. Unfortunately, now I’ve become so popular that I don’t have time to speak that much anymore.”

Like Alexander, Ahmet and us, also Marina Lindström from the multicultural co-operative Q-Coop thinks that Helsinki needs more ethnic kitchens. That’s why she’s planning to open a big restaurant and central kitchen in Kalasatama, a harbour area freed for residential construction only a few years ago. Her idea is to bring together people and cuisines from all over the world (e.g. West African, Iranian, Ethiopian, Indian and Kurdish) under the same roof, organise lunches, dinners and events as well as prepare food to be sold in smaller kiosks around the city. As her co-workers, the Finnish-born Marina has two Nigerian women, Esther Ademosu and Florence Awoyemi with whom she used to run the Yoruban Kimito Kitchen in Sörnäinen. Like many old harbour areas worldwide, food might help bring interesting people and activities to Kalasatama, too. But more than city planning in its traditional sense, Marina is interested in helping immigrants integrate and making Helsinki’s food culture – and through that, the whole atmosphere of the city – more international and open. After all, in the end, it is the cultural aspects that make a true city.

The article also appears on We Are Helsinki magazine’s food issue, 3/2010.

Daniel Palillo, Nene Tsuboi and the hooded tower of Helsinki Central railway station.

Traditionally known for its architecture, we believe Finland has recently been more innovative in other creative areas such as fashion and art. So, we sat down with Nene Tsuboi and Daniel Palillo to discuss architecture and urban design in Helsinki from another point of view.

While Tsuboi has contributed to the style of the city through architectural projects with NOW for Architecture and Urbanism, she has also designed colourful flags to take over the grey facades of Helsinki. This art project simulated the urban way of drying laundry outside the windows in Japan, Tsuboi’s home country. Palillo, on the other hand, shapes the street scene through his expressive frocks worn by people ranging from grannies to teenage boys all over Helsinki. He is known to be a big fan of the Austrian painter and architect Friedensreich Regentag Dunkelbunt Hundertwasser (1928-2000), famous for his experimental projects in urban environments. “Hundertwasser made his own clothes from what he found on the street,” Palillo tells. “He also had projects where people could, for example, paint anything a meter outside their own window in a block of flats.”

Nene Tsuboi enjoys city planning that is not too planned.

Tsuboi finds the spontaneous evolution of places very interesting, and enjoys city planning that is not too planned. “Walking past Tokoinranta almost every morning, I have noticed a melted spot full of ducks in the middle of the ice,” she explains. “One day, The Public Works Department had put up a sign with biological images of ducks as well as information on the species. The place became an official bird-watching spot by accident.” This kind of attitude makes Helsinki a more interesting place. Tsuboi tells that one of her urban design projects with NOW was based on the idea of giving people spaces and seeing what kind of places they make out of them. In the same vein, Palillo is planning to turn his backyard in Ullanlinna into a movie theater next summer.

Finding the digital clock and the hood with a 1:1 print of the building underneath covering the construction site in the tower of the Helsinki Central railway station (normally displaying an analog clock) a good design solution, we talked about dressing up buildings with Palillo and Tsuboi. “Construction sites could be vanished in the spirit of David Copperfield’s airplane trick where he uses a mirror and some smoke to make a plane disappear,” Palillo says. “The City Planning Department should hire magicians!”

“The City Planning Department should hire magicians!” – Daniel Palillo

“Being Japanese, I find it interesting how the functions of buildings are changed from offices to apartments here without the exterior changing at all,” Tsuboi says. “Looking at Helsinki facades, the inside of the buildings is a mystery while in Japan, the purpose of a building is clearly visible from the outside, and when the function changes, they change the whole building.” She likes the big sheets outside Ateneum, the Finnish National Gallery, that tell it’s an art museum. “What if more buildings had costumes saying ‘I’m a home for many kids!’ or ‘I’m a hospital!’?,” Tsuboi suggests.