Brighton-Turku

This international collaboration between the DHRC and the University of Turku derived from fairly modest beginnings. Maija Makikalli, a Finnish cultural history researcher into specific aspects of Finnish furniture manufacture and consumption had come to University to consider the ways in which design historians might approach such a study, felt that some form of institutional collaboration might be interesting.

After discussions with Jonathan Woodham it was felt that a small closed symposium in Finland involving design historians from Brighton and cultural historians from Turku might provide an appropriate means of better understanding the methods and approaches of both disciplines. However, a number of other institutions and museums in Finland expressed strong support for the idea and hoped that it could be a more open event.

External Finnish funding made this possible and soon the event grew from aDHRC/Brighton-Cultural History/Turku collaboration to a fully-fledged Symposium on Design, Technology and Cultural History also involving the University of Art and Design Helsinki (UIAH) and the University of Lapland.

Jonathan Woodham delivered the opening paper with further Brighton presentations by Paul Jobling, Louise Purbrick and Lesley Whitworth that addressed very different aspects of design historical studies. Technology (Department of Cultural History, University of Turku). Among the Finnish papers were presentations by Professor Pekka Korvenmaa (Department of Product and Strategic Design, UIAH), Juha Jarvinen (Designium, Centre of Design Innovation, UIAH) and Professor Hannu Salmi and the Doctoral Research Group on Design and Technology (Department of Cultural History, University of Turku). The event was considered to be an important one in Finland and has led the Rector of the University of Turku to request that a formal relationshipbe established with the University of Brighton in the area of design and cultural history. It is planned that the papers will be published in 2003: a leading arts publisher in Britain has expressed interest.

The event was considered to be an important one in Finland and has led the Rector of the University of Turku to request that a formal relationshipbe established with the University of Brighton in the area of design and cultural history. It is planned that the papers will be published in 2003 : a leading arts publisher in Britain has expressed interest.

Following the two-day symposium visits were organised around Aalvar Aalto’s work. This embraced the furniture factory (Korhonen Oy Huonekautehdas in Littoinen, Kaarina) where his work is still in production and his famous Paimio Sanatorium where delegates were shown round by a specialist researcher into Aalto’s work and members of the Aalto Foundation. A visit was also made to the Nokia Mobile Factory in Salo where delegates heard a presentation by a senior member of the Design Team and visited the production lines.