Wine by HDF

How to Complete

3 steps curated by Wine Memories

1. ⛰️ 1

   Walk Helsinki's Design Studios on Open Studios Friday

   adventure Free

   📍 WHERE: Across Helsinki's design neighbourhoods — Punavuori, Kruununhaka, Kamppi — on the first or second Friday of the festival (Open Studios, 4pm–7pm). Check the current year's studio map at helsinkidesignweek.com/events/open-studios.

   💡 WHAT: This is the secret engine of Wine by HDF. Helsinki Design Week doesn't just put wine in a bar — it builds an entire afternoon that ends at one. On two Fridays during the festival, the city's designers unlock their studio doors to strangers. You'll push open the door of a ceramics studio in Punavuori, a brand agency with a rooftop view over the Baltic, an interior architecture firm sketching out the next Scandinavian museum. They're not presenting. They're just… working, and letting you watch. Then at 7pm, the studios close, and everyone — designers, visitors, the curious — follows an invisible current toward the wine bar at the main venue.

   🎯 HOW: Arrive at 4pm. Download the studio map from the website or pick one up at Suomitalo. There's no ticket — Open Studios is free. Walk to 3–4 studios in a cluster (the app map groups them by neighbourhood). At each one, ask the designers what they're working on. They're expecting your questions — this is the point. At 6:30pm, start making your way to Suomitalo (Lönnrotinkatu 5) to arrive as the wine bar fills with the creative energy of 2 hours of studio visits.

   🔄 BACKUP: If you miss Open Studios Friday (they run weeks 1 and 2 of the festival), the wine bar at Suomitalo is open daily from noon for the full 10 days of the festival. The conversation is still design-driven; you've just skipped the warm-up.

   🍷 Log Memory
2. 🍷 2

   Toast Finnish Design in a 1911 Armas Lindgren Building

   wine $$

   📍 WHERE: Fourth floor of Suomitalo, Lönnrotinkatu 5, Helsinki. Take the lift — the fourth floor is where the HDW Wine Bar lives alongside the main festival exhibition. Tickets at the door: €15 / €7.50 concession (covers the full exhibition + wine bar access).

   💡 WHAT: Here's what nobody tells you about this building. Suomitalo was completed in 1911 — built from red Kökar granite for the Suomi Insurance Company. The facade was designed by Armas Lindgren, partner at Gesellius-Lindgren-Saarinen — the same architectural trio whose other partner, Eliel Saarinen, went on to design Helsinki Central Railway Station. You're drinking wine in a building designed by the Finnish equivalent of Michelangelo's studio. The building is named "Suomitalo" — literally "Finland's House" — because Suomi means Finland. And here you are, in Finland's House, surrounded by Finnish designers debating the future of design.

   🎯 HOW: Order from the current year's curated selection. In 2025, the wines were chosen by Finnish importer Viinimaa — an Italian-focused selection including Pasqua (founded 1925; 2023 Wine Enthusiast Innovator Award, first Italian winery ever to receive it) and Zonin (the largest family-owned winery in Italy). In 2023 and 2024, natural wine importers Let Me Wine ran the bar — organic and biodynamic producers, "making wine easy to approach, one delightful glass at a time." The partner changes each year, but the curation principle stays: wine chosen the way a designer chooses materials.

   🔄 BACKUP: If the wine bar is crowded, the main festival exhibition on the same floor is the backup — walk the installations with your glass. The fourth-floor view over Helsinki rooftops through the Art Nouveau windows is its own reward.

   🍷 Log Memory
3. 🍷 3

   Book the Kuurna Pop-Up: Two Finnish Institutions, One Anniversary Dinner

   Optional

   wine $$$$

   📍 WHERE: Top floor of Suomitalo, Lönnrotinkatu 5 — one floor above the wine bar, where Kuurna Restaurant sets up its annual pop-up for 4 nights only during the festival (typically 10–13 September, two seatings: 5pm and 8:30pm, Saturday 4pm).

   💡 WHAT: In 2025, something extraordinary happened. Helsinki Design Week turned 20. And Restaurant Kuurna — Helsinki's beloved fish-and-vegetarian institution — also turned 20. The same year. So when Kuurna returned to the HDW pop-up, it wasn't a restaurant doing a festival gig. It was two 20-year-old Helsinki institutions having a birthday dinner together. The menu: Kuurna classics from two decades, Finnish fish and organic produce from their own vegetable counter at Hakaniemi Market Hall. The wine pairing is curated specifically for these dishes. The bar snacks on the floor below you are made by Klaava — Kuurna's brand-new wine bar that opened next door to the restaurant on Meritullinkatu.

   🎯 HOW: Book in advance — this sells out within days of announcement. Check kuurna.fi and helsinkidesignweek.com in late July/early August for booking to open. Four-course dinner: €85. Wine pairing: €55. Non-alcoholic pairing: €45. Ask for the window table if possible — the view over Kampi and toward the sea at golden hour is exactly the kind of moment you flew here for.

   🔄 BACKUP: If fully booked, go to the Kuurna wine bar on the fourth floor for a glass + Klaava bar snacks — same kitchen, same team, no reservation needed. Or book at the actual Restaurant Kuurna on Meritullinkatu after the festival ends (reservations at kuurna.fi).

   🍷 Log Memory

Insider Tips

• ✦

  Check Helsinki Design Week program for exact venues

• ✦

  Combine with design showroom visits

• ✦

  Some events are free, others ticketed - check in advance