Harri Koskinen

Harri Koskinen is one of the best known current Finnish designers. He was born in Karstula, Finland in 1970. He started his design career at Iittala under the tutelage of Oiva Toikka, but soon became an independent designer. He has designed for Alessi, Cassina, Issey Miyake, Muji, Oluce and other international brands. Currently he is heading design for Iittala as a Design Director, while still also continuing his own studio. He has created both mass production items as well as limited edition Art Works design glass for Iittala.

His best known design is probably the Block lamp, which has a lightbulb held inside two clear blocks of glass. It is featured in New York Museum of Modern Art’s Design collection.

He has won several awards, including the Compasso d’Oro in 2004 and the Torsten and Wanja Söderberg Award in 2009 for his sustainable design work. With the amount of SEK 1,000,000 it is the largest design prize in the world. The reasoning of the prize committee was stated as: “Harri Koskinen is one of the foremost designers now occupied with the task of continuing the Nordic design tradition. His extensive, wide-ranging body of work has a unique, austere design that is consistently expressed with clear Nordic roots in its demands for good function and simplicity of form, as well as in the choice of materials. These elements combine to create lasting value. At the same time as he enjoys successful partnerships with design-intensive companies around the world, he is also participating in the renewal of his homeland’s design industry.”