Young Designer of the Year 2000:
Harri Koskinen, Ilkka Suppanen
The prize of 2000 was given in particular recognition of an international breakthrough in the field of design. The prize jury selected two young cosmopolitan designers who have achieved broad international acclaim and professional collaboration with international companies, without compromising their ideas and concepts.
The works of both these designers reflect a continuation of the Finnish design tradition in the interpretations of a new generation. Both designers have demonstrated deliberation, long-term effort and exceptional creative skills.
Harri Koskinen
Harri Koskinen (b. 1970) has worked in a variety of materials. Glass is closest to him, but he has also designed products of metal and wood. His works are characterized by practical aspects, an unaffected manner and a search for new solutions, combined with an unforced approach and a feel for the material and insight. Harri Koskinen's works have been presented extensively in international design magazines and journals. He has also collaborate with many foreign companies and firms. At present, Koskinen is working for Iittala alongside his freelance work.
Harri Koskinen is a thinker who crystallizes his message in a simple, unadorned language of form in keeping with the tradition of Finnish design. Koskinen's most recent project is an exhibition upon the invitation of the Issey Miyake gallery in Tokyo.
Ilkka Suppanen
Like many of his generation of designers, Ilkka Suppanen (b. 1968) worked actively abroad already as a student. Suppanen has designed furniture and lamps that contribute to a new life style of change, flexibility and fast tempo. A common denominator of his works is found in their lightness and "immateriality", for which he has found new forms of interpretation. Suppanen's works have also received acclaim abroad. He is in active collaboration with international companies, and he has been invited to exhibit abroad, most recently in Belgium to create an exhibition installation.
Ilkka Suppanen's works are marked by the sustained and long-term development of an idea into a functioning product. He has his own distinct language of form relying on the classic Nordic tradition but interpreted in a new way and in new materials.
