Category Archives: Inspiration

domestic days

Days just seem to pass without anything special happening. Thatâ€™s alright, though. But Iâ€™ve done a few things, both for my own wellbeing and for the progress of our house building. Iâ€™ve read a few novels. What a luxury to lie most of the day in bed, reading! Amazing. Yesterday I defrosted the freezer and cleaned the fridge. Now we are ready for the ripening forest berries and strawberries, which we have to buy, though. But itâ€™s my and my daughterâ€™s tradition to buy a box of strawberries and put them in the freezer for the winter. And every time I make strawberry kissel during the winter, we think about how great it was that put the berries into the freezer.
Iâ€™ve kept up with my running and functional training. Most weeks I do three runs and one functional training. If I donâ€™t make it to the functional training, I do a fourth run or go to the gym. I really like the balance of doing running and whole body workout as running in itself is so straining for the legs. Anywayâ€¦
Last week was by daughterâ€™s birthday and we had a really nice party. First we celebrated with children and then had some friends over. We baked a lot but for the kids we made this inchworm cake. We had a so much fun and it was such a pleasure to see friends and hang out all night.

The next day I went with my daughter to a friendâ€™s place which is about 30 minutes out of Kuopio. It was heavenly. We went between the sauna and the lake all night, ate pancakes, had serious womenâ€™s conversations and just relaxed. I canâ€™t believe some people live in those kinds of places. And yet, at the same time I envy the friends living in New York or London. But, at least I, need both. The country life & the most urban cities. Besides the amazing site by the lake including a wonderful garden, I guess I mostly enjoyed the company of the hostess. I canâ€™t remember when I last have had a sauna with another woman, talking heart to heart, sharing, thinking and just being together in the Finnish sauna. It was truly a bliss.

Kuopio is one of the worst shopping places on earth â€“ at least thatâ€™s how it felt today. This was the second time I went to the sales and tried to find something but came back empty handed. Itâ€™s ok as I donâ€™t really have money to buy anything but sometimes it really sucks. So I ended up buying a lot of bread from the factory outlet of Vaasan & Vaasan and beetroot lasagne from the factory outlet of Kasvisgalleria.

Have joyous days!

Johanna

impressions & some iconic images of New York

The site-specific performance symposium in New York was very good and exciting and I thank Gulgun, Bertie & Frank for inviting me. It was very important for me to hear about several projects and festivals done by an exciting mix of curators, artists and venues. And in terms of curating and organizing the ANTI Festival, it was also great to feel that we are part of a whole field working site-specifically and sharing a lot of similar concerns, challenges and issues.
My schedule in New York was quite tight and my visit rather short, but here are some images I took during my walks. Many of them are very iconic and typical images of New York but I guess the same images have to be taken over and over again as New York is just amazing. Unfortunately, I don’t have any images of the symposium or my 10k run in the Central Park. I was supposed to participate in a running event here in Kuopio in May but then this trip came about and I couldn’t take part in it. So I promised to myself and my trainer, that I will run 10k on my own in the Central Park, my goal being that I run it in less than an hour. Well, I did it in 58 minutes and it was truly an amazing feeling to be running there. And I was pretty satisfied with my performance that went easily and smoothly.

Images from where I stayed – in the middle of Manhattan:

My hotel Carlton Arms which I can highly recommend:

My stop:

The ruins of WTC:

A walk in Soho:

A boat trip to Staten Island:

Nighttime visit to the Empire State Building:

thinking about kitchens

I had a meeting with Esa from Gatto kitchen in the morning. I have a pretty clear idea about our new kitchen that we have outlined with the architect of the Blue House Satu Ratinen. But still there are a lot of possibilities in terms of colours and shades, materials, equipment and all kinds of details. Iâ€™ve had meetings with three kitchen companies and now it seems that the choice is going to be between Domus and Gatto. In both cases, the material is pretty comparable, but the colour is somewhat different. In Gattoâ€™s case the cupboards and boxes would be quite dark but in a kind of grey shade and in Domusâ€™s plan the boxes below the work top would be black ash and the top cupboards from zebrano. In both plans the cold line would be from Festivo and from Gatto the other kitchen electronics from Smeg. With Domus we havenâ€™t really decided on the oven, dishwasher etc. But I guess I still could by the Smeg dishwasher, oven and the cooker from Gatto even if I wouldnâ€™t buy the cupboards.
Well, lotâ€™s to think about. And the real issue here is that Iâ€™m so aware of the vast possibilities. If I didnâ€™t order all the interior design magazines I wouldnâ€™t know so much about all kinds of possibilities and materials. So I can only blame the decade long addict of ordering Avotakka, Koti ja KeittiÃ¶, Plaza, Living etc., deko, MeidÃ¤n taloâ€¦!
I must say that one important thing for me is also the fact that Domus is a Finnish company and Gattoâ€™s stuff is ordered from Italy. And since we are building an eco house, I definitely prefer the local suppliers â€“ although that principle can be overruled for the sake of good designâ€¦

We have had a very unusual winter with no snow and temperature staying on top of the 0. Today wasnâ€™t cold but it snowed a lot. It feels like all the snow we have missed since November fell down today. The kids are excited, of course.

We havenâ€™t had time to visit my partnerâ€™s mom for about 9 months, but now we decided that we are going to visit her for the weekend and rest from the house building. So Iâ€™m looking forward to having saunas, sitting by the fireplace and enjoying the joy of my daughter spending time with her grandma.
Johanna