Style combination · Pairs well

Finnish Bold Print × Finnish Symbol Poster

The same Finnish flat colour and enlarged motif, one as a single sign on paper, the other as a repeat on cloth: pair a symbol poster with a printed-textile ground.

From the research on Finnish Symbol Poster (the 'Finnish School', 1954–1995)

Mix them and make something Finnish Bold Print Finnish Symbol Poster

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Finnish Bold Print, their arrangement from Finnish Bold Print, the finish from Finnish Bold Print. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Finnish Bold Print (Marimekko Modernism) Finnish Symbol Poster (the 'Finnish School', 1954–1995)

Type from Finnish Symbol Poster
Colour from Finnish Symbol Poster: Limited spot colours
Flat fields
Form from Finnish Bold Print: Biomorphic curves
Non-representational
Composition from Finnish Bold Print: All-over field
Repetition & rhythm
Surface from Finnish Bold Print: Painterly brushwork
Flat

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Finnish Symbol Poster

Pop

Inter Tight, standing in for One line of bold, tightly set neo-grotesque lower case for 'Your Lifemeter' (Varis, 1970), with hand-written numerals on the image itself

Text · Finnish Bold Print

The printed-cotton modernism of Marimekko, founded in Helsinki in 1951 by Armi and Viljo Ratia out of Viljo's printing firm Printex. Its designers, chiefly Maija Isola, the first (1949-1987), with Vuokko Nurmesniemi (1953-1960) and from 1960 Annika Rimala, painted or cut one motif (stones, a poppy, waves, stripes), enlarged it to repeats often over half a metre and screen-printed it edge to edge in a few flat inks, often on white. It turns the Nordic ideal of good everyday things into one pattern for dress, curtain and home; from 1974 Fujiwo Ishimoto added brushstroke and calligraphic marks.

Inter; Finnish Bold Print used The Marimekko wordmark (in use since 1954) and Selvedge inscriptions repeated along the edge of the cloth, naming designer, pattern, maker, country and year

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Finnish Symbol Poster, with a counter-accent from Finnish Bold Print. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Finnish Bold Print (Marimekko Modernism) Finnish Symbol Poster (the 'Finnish School', 1954–1995)

#f3efe6 ground · 36%
#151515 ink · 14%
#ee8a1d accent · 18%
#d22f27 accent · 14%
#1f4f9a accent · 10%
#e8478b accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f3efe6;
  --ink: #151515;
  --accent-1: #ee8a1d;
  --accent-2: #d22f27;
  --accent-3: #1f4f9a;
  --accent-4: #e8478b;
  --font-display: "Inter Tight", sans-serif;
  --font-text: "Inter", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

Finnish Bold Print (Marimekko Modernism): Many of the best-known patterns, Unikko and Kivet among them, are still produced by Marimekko and remain protected designs, so work in the manner rather than copying them. Folk sources carry two further, separate risks. Anonymous folk ornament can be living devotional material: the käspaikka, the Karelian linen towel named in Isola's 1959 print, is still used to dress icons in Orthodox churches and homes, so abstract such ornament rather than quote it, and keep it out of contexts that trivialise it. A named folk artist's work is authored, not a shared tradition: in 2013 Kristina Isola admitted that her 'Metsänväki' (2007), by then painted on a Finnair aircraft, copied elements of Maria Prymachenko's 1963 painting 'Rat on a Journey'; Finnair undertook to repaint the plane and Marimekko ended its collaboration with Kristina Isola in September 2013.