Architecture & Design Museum Helsinki unveils major transformation ahead of new museum

A new free-to-enter ground floor

As part of the transformation, the first floor of the Architecture & Design Museum Helsinki will become a welcoming, admission-free space where anyone can stop by, take a break, and find inspiration. The redesigned floor will bring together an expanded Design Shop, a new book gallery, and a new restaurant by Helsinki-based Restaurant Nolita.

Located in the heart of Helsinki’s Design District, the museum’s Design Shop will be developed into a distinctive destination for Finnish design, with a selection that evolves in response to current ideas and trends. The museum’s food and dining experience will also expand with a new Café Nolita. Behind the new restaurant are Luka Balać, Carlos Henriques, and Albert Franch Sunyer, the owners behind the successful Helsinki restaurants Nolla, Elm, and Nolita in Kankurinkatu.

The museum library will reopen as a book gallery, combining library services with a bookstore. The Aalto Lounge, created for the Aalto Design exhibition, will remain after the exhibition closes and serve as a space for reading, meeting, and spending time.

The first-floor interior architecture is being designed by Helsinki-based Design Agency Fyra. The redesign will respect the building’s original architecture while bringing its distinctive features back into view. New services will be integrated beneath the building’s vaulted arches, and windows that have recently been covered will be revealed again. Existing spaces will take on new uses, while objects from the museum’s design and architecture collections will extend beyond the exhibition galleries into other parts of the building.

“This period of transformation gives us a unique opportunity to rethink the museum as a complete experience that is meaningful to many different kinds of visitors. We also want to better serve the growing number of people visiting Helsinki and offer an engaging way to immerse themselves in the world of Finnish design, while maintaining a critical perspective on our cultural heritage and our responsibility to carry it forward,” says Museum Director Pilvi Kalhama.

Finnish architecture and design reconsidered

The museum’s second floor will feature an extensive exhibition showcasing the Architecture & Design Museum Helsinki’s collections on an unprecedented scale.

Rather than telling a single, chronological story, the exhibition approaches the history of Finnish architecture and design as a polyphonic and continually evolving constellation of stories. Through changing displays, the exhibition explores how ideas of national heritage have been constructed over time, and how Finnish architecture and design have emerged through multiple, overlapping and at times conflicting influences, both within Finland and through international exchange.

A vast array of objects will be on view, ranging from textiles, glass and ceramics to furniture and electronics, alongside architectural models, photographs and drawings. The exhibition features works by a wide range of architecture and design luminaries, including Aino, Alvar and Elissa Aalto, Carin Bryggman, Rut Bryk, Aarne Ervi, Kaj Franck, Theodor Höijer, Birger Kaipiainen, Juha Leiviskä, Vuokko and Antti Nurmesniemi, Raili and Reima Pietilä, Eliel and Eero Saarinen, Ilmari Tapiovaara and Paavo Tynell.

“The history of Finnish architecture and design can be viewed from countless perspectives. With this exhibition, we did not want to lock that history into a single interpretation, but to create an evolving experience that offers visitors something new each time. Familiar classics can take on new meanings when seen from different perspectives. The Architecture & Design Museum Helsinki has a singular collection that provide an extraordinary foundation for this approach. We invite visitors to consider how objects acquire meaning and how our understanding of history continues to evolve,” says Carson Chan, Chief Curator of the exhibition.

The classics remain, while perspectives change

The content of the collection survey exhibition will change every three months, giving visitors new perspectives on the collections throughout the year. At its permanent core are classics of Finnish architecture and design, presented in ways that highlight the international exchange that has shaped their development.

A permanent section will also draw on the museum’s Marimekko collection, the largest in the world.

Changing sections will bring distinct perspectives and atmospheres to the exhibition. Displays opening in March will invite visitors to experience the dimly lit atmosphere of an early 20th-century Jugend (Art Nouveau) home through a reconstruction of Koti, an early design by the architectural practice Gesellius, Lindgren, Saarinen. Another immersive space will explore the Oulu School, an architectural movement that emerged in northern Finland in the 1980s.

The exhibition architecture by Aalto & Aalto embraces abundance, layering and unexpected perspectives. Interpretation has been designed for different audiences, including dedicated exhibition texts for children.

A gallery for contemporary voices

Alongside the collection exhibition, a new series of gallery exhibitions will shift the focus from the museum’s historical collections to contemporary practice in architecture and design.

The program opens with a joint exhibition by artists and designers Armi Teva and Santeri Mortti, exploring the significance of contemporary craft at a time when speed and efficiency have increasingly become the norm. The exhibition will bring together existing and new works alongside a collaborative piece created especially for the occasion.

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