Finnish lines
Dense rows of fir trees punctured by frozen lakes and oxblood red cabins; children in snow boots navigating icy pavements; crystal-tipped grass that crunches underfoot. The journey to the studio of Yrjö Kukkapuro on the outskirts of Helsinki is fittingly Finnish. But once inside, all Nordic clichés end. Rows of chairs with colourful legs and graffti-splattered backs are stacked in seemingly random groups; books, paintbrushes, sketches and models occupy every surface; sunlit walls are crowded with images and cuttings, and in the middle of it all sits 86-year-old Kukkapuro in his canary yellow cap.
If anyone has a design back catalogue that sums up the artistic movements and global economic shifts of the past century, it is Kukkapuro. He qualified as an industrial designer in the 1950s, a golden age in Finnish design thanks to Alvar Aalto,
