Marimekko Oyj is a
Finnish
Finnish may refer to:
* Something or someone from, or related to Finland
* Culture of Finland
* Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland
* Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people
* Finnish cuisine
See also ...
textiles, clothing, and home furnishings company founded by Viljo and
Armi Ratia
Armi Maria Ratia née Airaksinen (13 July 1912 – 3 October 1979) was the co-founder of the Finnish textile and clothing company Marimekko Oy. She is among Finland's most famous female entrepreneurs. She was born in Pälkjärvi in Ladoga Kareli ...
in
Helsinki
Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...
in 1951. Marimekko made important contributions to
fashion
Fashion is a form of self-expression and autonomy at a particular period and place and in a specific context, of clothing, footwear, lifestyle, accessories, makeup, hairstyle, and body posture. The term implies a look defined by the fashion in ...
in the 1960s. It is particularly noted for its brightly colored printed fabrics and simple styles, used both in women's garments and in home furnishings.
Two designers in particular,
Vuokko Nurmesniemi
Vuokko Hillevi Lilian Eskolin-Nurmesniemi (born 12 February 1930 in Helsinki) is a Finnish textile designer. She is best known for her work as one of the two leading designers of the Marimekko company. Her signature striped ''Jokapoika'' shirt hel ...
, with bold stripes, and
Maija Isola
Maija Sofia Isola (15 March 1927 – 3 March 2001) was a Finnish designer of printed textiles, and the creator of over 500 patterns, including ''Unikko'' ("Poppy"). The bold, colourful prints she created as the head designer of Marimekko made t ...
, with large simple flowered prints such as the ''Unikko''
poppy
A poppy is a flowering plant in the subfamily Papaveroideae of the family Papaveraceae. Poppies are herbaceous plants, often grown for their colourful flowers. One species of poppy, ''Papaver somniferum'', is the source of the narcotic drug opi ...
, created hundreds of distinctive patterns and helped to make Marimekko a household name across the world.
Etymology
The co-founder, Armi Ratia, first considered ''Armi'' as the company's name, but it was already registered. Her middle name was Maria, shortened to ''Mari''; her husband Viljo thought of different names for women's clothing. In her home town of Koivisto, Armi heard people talking about
dress
A dress (also known as a frock or a gown) is a garment traditionally worn by women or girls consisting of a skirt with an attached bodice (or a matching bodice giving the effect of a one-piece garment). It consists of a top piece that covers ...
es ( fi, mekko), and so she came to the name Marimekko.
History
Foundation
Marimekko was founded in 1951 by Viljo and Armi Ratia, after the Viljo's oil-cloth factory project failed and was converted to a garment plant. Armi asked some artist friends to apply their
graphic design
Graphic design is a profession, academic discipline and applied art whose activity consists in projecting visual communications intended to transmit specific messages to social groups, with specific objectives. Graphic design is an interdiscipli ...
s to
textiles
Textile is an umbrella term that includes various fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, filaments, threads, different fabric types, etc. At first, the word "textiles" only referred to woven fabrics. However, weaving is not the ...
. To show how the fabric could be used, the company then designed and sold a line of simple dresses using their fabric. When Finland's leading
industrial design
Industrial design is a process of design applied to physical Product (business), products that are to be manufactured by mass production. It is the creative act of determining and defining a product's form and features, which takes place in advan ...
er
Timo Sarpaneva
Timo Tapani Sarpaneva (31 October 1926 – 6 October 2006) was an influential Finnish designer, sculptor, and educator best known in the art world for innovative work in glass, which often merged attributes of display art objects with utilitaria ...
invited the company to present a
fashion show
A fashion show ( French ''défilé de mode'') is an event put on by a fashion designer to showcase their upcoming line of clothing and/or accessories during a fashion week. Fashion shows debut every season, particularly the Spring/Summer and Fa ...
(albeit canceled at short notice) at the 1957
Triennale
The Triennale di Milano is a design and art museum in the Parco Sempione in Milan, in Lombardy in northern Italy. It is housed in the Palazzo dell'Arte, which was designed by Giovanni Muzio and built between 1931 and 1933; construction was fina ...
in
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
, it was an early recognition of fashion as an industrial art and of Marimekko's key role in shaping it to that point. The garments were eventually showcased in the nearby
Rinascente upscale department store by display manager
Giorgio Armani
Giorgio Armani (; born 11 July 1934) is an Italian fashion designer. He first gained notoriety working for Cerruti and then for many others, including Allegri, Bagutta and Hilton. He formed his company, Armani, in 1975, which eventually expande ...
.
Pioneering design
Two pioneering designers set the tone for Marimekko:
Vuokko Nurmesniemi
Vuokko Hillevi Lilian Eskolin-Nurmesniemi (born 12 February 1930 in Helsinki) is a Finnish textile designer. She is best known for her work as one of the two leading designers of the Marimekko company. Her signature striped ''Jokapoika'' shirt hel ...
in the 1950s and
Maija Isola
Maija Sofia Isola (15 March 1927 – 3 March 2001) was a Finnish designer of printed textiles, and the creator of over 500 patterns, including ''Unikko'' ("Poppy"). The bold, colourful prints she created as the head designer of Marimekko made t ...
in the 1960s. Nurmesniemi designed the simply striped red and white ''Jokapoika'' shirt in 1956. Isola designed the iconic ''Unikko'' (
poppy
A poppy is a flowering plant in the subfamily Papaveroideae of the family Papaveraceae. Poppies are herbaceous plants, often grown for their colourful flowers. One species of poppy, ''Papaver somniferum'', is the source of the narcotic drug opi ...
) print pattern in 1964.
Marimekko's bold fabrics and bright, simple design strongly influenced late 20th-century taste. Many of the early Marimekko designs, including Isola's ''Unikko'', remain in production in the 2010s.
Commercial growth
Marimekko spread to America in the 1960s. It was introduced to the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
by the architect
Benjamin C. Thompson, who featured them in his
Design Research stores. They were made famous in the United States by future first lady
Jacqueline Kennedy
Jacqueline Lee Kennedy Onassis ( ; July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was an American socialite, writer, photographer, and book editor who served as first lady of the United States from 1961 to 1963, as the wife of President John F. Kennedy. A po ...
, who bought eight Marimekko dresses which she wore throughout the
1960 United States presidential campaign.
By 1965, the company employed over 400 staff, and the company was in every aspect of fine design, from fabrics to toys and dinnerware. The firm even completely equipped small houses with furnishings. In 1985, the company was sold to
Amer-yhtymä. In the early 1990s, Marimekko was in a bad financial condition and close to bankruptcy. It was bought from Amer by
Kirsti Paakkanen
Kirsti Paakkanen ( Poikonen; 12 February 1929 — 2 November 2021) was a Finnish entrepreneur and business executive.
Career
Paakkanen studied advertising, and worked for many years in the marketing departments of Finnish retail companies incl ...
, who introduced new business methods in the company and helped to revive its popularity.
Later in the 1990s Marimekko achieved publicity in the hit TV series ''
Sex and the City
''Sex and the City'' is an American romantic comedy, romantic comedy-drama television series created by Darren Star for HBO. An adaptation of Candace Bushnell's Sex and the City (newspaper column), newspaper column and 1996 book anthology of the ...
''. The fictional main character of the series, sex-and-relationship columnist
Carrie Bradshaw
Caroline Marie "Carrie" Bradshaw is a fictional character from the HBO franchise ''Sex and the City'', portrayed by Sarah Jessica Parker. Candace Bushnell created Carrie as a semi-autobiographical character for her column "Sex and the City" in ...
, wore a Marimekko bikini on
season 2 and then a Marimekko dress. In
season 5 the series introduced tablecloths with Marimekko prints.
In 2005, Marimekko's revenue had quadrupled since Paakkanen's purchase, and its net income had grown 200-fold. Paakkanen remained CEO of Marimekko and owned 20% of the company via her business Workidea. In 2007, Paakkanen announced she would gradually hand over her ownership to Mika Ihamuotila as CEO and biggest owner of the company. By 2011 there were 84 stores across the world.
Marimekko products are made in China, India, Thailand, Portugal, Lithuania and other countries. Fabrics are printed in Marimekko's textile factory in Helsinki, but are not made in Finland.
Logo
The logo of Marimekko has been in use since 1954. Armi Ratia wanted the logo to be simple and timeless. Graphic designer Helge Mether-Borgström used modified versions of classic
Olivetti
Olivetti S.p.A. is an Italian manufacturer of computers, tablets, smartphones, printers and other such business products as calculators and fax machines. Headquartered in Ivrea, in the Metropolitan City of Turin, the company has been part of ...
typewriter
A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an inked ribbon selectivel ...
letters to create the logo.
Reception
Cindy Babski wrote in the ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' that "There was never any doubt about what the inside label would say. The clothes and fabrics, with their striking design and splashes of bold color, were clearly Marimekko. But for people of a certain generation—those who came of age in the 1960s—they represented more than just a brand name: They conjured up an image and an era."
In 2007, Heidi Avellan wrote in the Swedish newspaper ''
Sydsvenskan
''Sydsvenska Dagbladet Snällposten'', generally known simply as ''Sydsvenskan'' (, ''The South Swedish''), is a daily newspaper published in Scania in Sweden.
History and profile
''Sydsvenskan'' was founded in 1870. In 1871 the paper merged w ...
'' that Marimekko was no longer a "statement, just as T-shirts with revolutionary
Che Guevara
Ernesto Che Guevara (; 14 June 1928The date of birth recorded on /upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Ernesto_Guevara_Acta_de_Nacimiento.jpg his birth certificatewas 14 June 1928, although one tertiary source, (Julia Constenla, quoted ...
or
Palestinian scarves rarely express any political awareness. Marimekko is paper napkins and rubber boots". She wrote that Marimekko "began with the colourfully striped shirt, ''Jokapoika'' which Vuokko Nurmesniemi designed in 1956", which became the symbol for new radicalism in academia.
References
Citations
Bibliography
*
* ''(6 page-sized illustrations of Isola's prints)'
Google Books*
*
Further reading
*
*
External links
*
{{Authority control
Finnish design
Fashion design
Clothing companies of Finland
Clothing brands
Finnish brands
High fashion brands
Manufacturing companies based in Helsinki
Design companies established in 1951
Manufacturing companies established in 1951
Companies listed on Nasdaq Helsinki
Eyewear brands of Finland
Finnish companies established in 1951