By now, Fiskars Design Village has become one of the most beautiful and harmonic examples of the combination of Slow Life and Slow Design. The programs organised in the framework of the designfest do not only introduce the village's applied arts and design values, but the region's gastro culture can also be tasted.

The flagship exhibition of the Finnish programs is the Fiskars Design Village goes Budapest: New and Classics exhibition arriving to Budapest straight from the Helsinki Design Museum where it appeared as the official part of the World Design Capital 2012 program. Displaying works from members of the Cooperative of Artisans, Designers and Artists in Fiskars founded in 1996, the exhibition is open on the upper floor of Design Terminal between 28th September and 28th October.

In addition to design and arts, gastronomy also plays an important role in the life of Fiskars Village. Thanks to Fiskars Wärdshus operating in the artists' village, contemporary Finnish and Scandinavian gastro culture can be experienced at the pop-up restaurant decorated with works from Finnish designers and design classics. It is open from 29th September till 21st October in Hütte Café, Budapest. The dishes offered in Wärssy pop up restaurant are prepared in line with the standards of Slow Food and Slow Dining from fresh ingredients by Chef Patrick Karlsson.

Some of the objects displayed at the Fiskars Design Village goes Budapest: New and Classics exhibition can be bought at the Onoma pop-up shop open on the ground floor of Design Terminal, in Hybridart Design Shop & Café between 29th September and 28th October. In the framework of the Design Week Special Edition of Budapest Design Meetup starting at 19:00 on 29th September in Ankert participants can listen to presentations by Leena Pasanen, director of Finnagora and three artists of the village, Karin Widnäs, ceramic artist, Antti Siltavuori, architect and industrial designer, the curator of several exhibitions held in Fiskars, a designer of Archdesign, and Camilla Moberg, artist and industrial designer.

The history of Fiskars village

The small village of a total of 600 inhabitants is located about 100 kilometres south-west of Helsinki. The picturesque environment rich in natural resources could in itself make the settlement famous, but the international fame is not the result of the exceptional location. In the past few decades, Fiskars Village has had every right to use the word design in its name: Fiskars Design Village. While the economic history of the village goes back to 1649, to the foundation of the first ironworks, the process of becoming a design village started in 1987.

Most of the over 300-year history of Fiskars company famous of its orange scissors was written in this area, still by the '80s the village was almost completely empty, as the company moved away. The genuine idea of inviting artists to the abandoned workers' flats and workshops was conceived in 1987. In the past decades about 120 artists and designers moved in the village, then in 1996 the Artisans, Designers and Artists of Fiskars Co-operative (the so-called Cooperative) was founded.

The empty workshops were filled with life, the houses were redecorated, exhibition spaces were created, and the Finnish society and the entire world started to discover the artist village representing the values of Slow Life.

The Finland – Fiskars Village guest of honour programs of Budapest Design Week are organised and supported by Finnagora in cooperation with the Cooperative, Wärdshus Restaurant, and MOME line – design works.

Organised for the ninth time this year, Budapest Design Week takes place between 28th September and 7th October 2012. The festival is supported by the Hungarian Intellectual Property Office and the National Cultural Fund of Hungary, with the Hungarian Design Council serving as its patron and is organised by Design Terminal, an institution of Forum Hungaricum.

Source and further information: www.designweek.hu