New Finnish Design!

What is new Finnish design? How would it be relevant globally? What are the new areas of opportunity in the rapidly evolving global markets, especially in the US? Those were some of the questions we aimed to answer as we delved into the future of design to identify future opportunities for Finnish design companies and designers to broaden their international horizons and better collaborate and cooperate for bolder global projects.

The project, dubbed as 'Designia Maailmalle', was funded by Finnish Cultural Institute in New York and Consulate General of Finland in New York, who wanted to explore the future directions for Finnish design exports and events in the US. The outcome, a 40-page-long report is available here for both reading and download (in Finnish only, apologies for the rest 99,9% of the 'deserati'). The report drafts a vision, strategic opportunity areas and practical guidance for both public and private sector actors to better facilitate international collaboration and accomplish commercial success. 

To uncover the future opportunitites we paddled through dozens of viewpoints to what design is and where it is going, interviewed some 30 leading Finnish design thinkers and doers, immersed into both contemporary and next wave Finnish design, and sat endless hours on rather poorly designed chairs to craft a vision for new Finnish design. The result was a description, though not a prescription, for Finnish design as a profession, process and product to be increasingly relevant globally in the midst of our turbulent times.

In short, the future opportunity landscape for Finnish design seems to be expanding simultaneously both vertically and horizontally, as design thinking is being integrated in numerous processes of business and policy and as the design principles and practices are being adopted everywhere from corporations to local communities and beyond. This should be jolly good news for all design aficionados, but in practice these shifts have caught many old school object-centric design idealists red-handed, still polishing their chairs and vases. In general, Finnish culture as a whole continues to bask in the glory of the half a century old story of great Finnish design and desperately swears allegiance to objects manufactured decades ago as the namesakes for 'Finnish design'.

But in the shadows of this nostalgic object hegemony is emerging a new cadre of Finnish design thinkers and doers who believe in design with a bigger mission and understand how design holistically spans from strategy to services and solutions. In fact, closely resembling the socially conscious and holistic approach of the grand old man of Finnish design, mr. Aalto, who already sported this view over 80 years ago. These next wave Finnish designers also believe that design can consistently create more value for people, communities and society, and does it best through constant collaboration and cooperation between designers and design communities worldwide.

These are some of the principles that allow the new generation of Finnish designers to relentlessly explore the vanguard of change and better realize more transformative, ingenious and natively global work. They are showing the way for an enhanced vision and definition for new Finnish design, and are likely to grasp the international opportunities and be responsible for the future Finnish design success stories.