Time Stands Still in Hannele's Summer Shop

Here's another example of a shop set up in a country house that can be seen as "a slow lifestyle store". Hannele's, a Finnish interior design product internet store (http://www.hanneles.fi/), opened a Summer Shop in Leppävesi, near Jyväskylä. The assortment includes old and new furniture and other decoration products in coutry romantic style. The shop is open in July and August, on other cases as agreed. I visited the shop on a beautiful summer day last July.

Hannele's summer shop

Summer Shop in an Old Farm

The shop is situated in a hut in an old wooden country house built in the 18th century. The whole farm is a fascinating place with many smaller buildings such as a sauna, a storehouse and a grilling cottage. A perfect place for different kinds of events, or a cafeteria maybe?!? Ideas started running through my mind already, before even seing the shop... 

A beautiful storehouse has potential for use as an accommodation or a cafeteria maybe?

The grilling cottage

Decorated with Hannele's products, of course

The Entrance

A little "appetizer" of the shop's assortment was already placed in the entrance. The products offered a sneak preview on the assortment of the store and the first shopping possibility. It also marked the entrance and welcomed the customer in to the commercial space. And pleace notice the price marking: cake paper! So cute, a bit like lace... I wanted to see more!

The entrance

The Shop's Design

The hut itself has a facinating history: way back in time the hut was a 2-store room, the animals lived in the first floor and the people on the second floor! Nowadays the hut is 4,7 meters high one store room. The eye-catcher in the hut was the beautiful massive baking oven on the corner. It was very imressive and had a huge effect on the atmosphere of the space.

The massive baking oven dominates the space...

...and offered a place for product display!

The hut was beautifuly renovated respecting the warm spirit of the place. Old timber walls were left on sight, but there was a white panel in the lower part of the wall to give a better background to the products and to make the room look more fresh.

Hannele in her shop

The old tools on the wall tell a story about the history of the farm

The Assortment

The assortment included old and new decoration products. Some of the furniture were for sale, too, but they also functioned as fixtures for the display of smaller products. Some of the products are old, some are new but made to look old styled.

A fixture on the wall was made of old hey spikes, a very innovative and original idea!

Time really stands still in Hannele's summer shop!

The products were beautiful ant mostly true to style, but afterwards I got to think that many of the products were from aboard, from Danish brands. I'm sure that a traditional store like this could also sell local crafts products that are suitable with the other products? In my mind it would bring added value to the assortment to have something local in the store, besides the shelfs which are made in Finland. But maybe some textile or ceramic products, too?

The Blogger's Favourite

The Blogger loves her new Calou wooden shoes!

My new shoes <3

In the wintertime the shop is open only if agreed, but the internetshop is open all year round. So if you happen to be in Jyväskylä, give Hannele a call and ask if she can open the shop, it's well worth for visiting! You can find her contact information on the shop's web pages.

Huldan Huvila - Crafts Life Style Shop

From fashion to crafts. Last summer me and my friend Pia visited in Huldan huvila crafts store (http://www.huldanhuvila.fi/index.html), which is located in Korkeakoski in Kotka. To me, Huldan huvila represents the slow kind of living, of which I have written earlier in this blog. So in a way, this can be seen as a "Finnish slow life style store".

The Store

Huldan huvila is located in a yellow wooden 2-store single family house. The store is situated in the first floor, and on the second floor there was a small painting exhibition.

The yellow theme from the facade continued in the interiors enriched with orange tones e.g in walls and curtains. It brought a very energetic and retro atmosphere to the interior. The whole store was like a trip back to childhood summers, to grandmum's place back at 60's (not that I have any experience from that decade). But of course Huldan huvila is a commercial space instead of being a museum.

The store was decorated mostly with old furniture which offered an authentic background to the product displays. Some of the old furniture were also for sale. In the displays I saw similar ideas that I had seen on design markets (e.g. putting the products on display on an old suitcase), but the interior made the display ideas a more authentic. Here are some examples of the displays:

Like in a proper life style store, also in Huldan huvila there are slight hints about the origins of the building and it's use as a housung purpose. Old itmes placed here and there tell the story of the house and build the atmosphere in their own part. Like old wooden skies in the corner, or the basket of woods (which is also a necessity in the wintertime, of course).

Another unique thing is that Huldan huvila offers their customers home made buns and coffee that is slowly boiled in an old fashioned coffee pan. You can pay for the servings according to your own councious. Another statement for the slow way of life!

The Products

The idea of Huldan huvila is to rent shelf space for crafts makers and to sell their products in return. Because of this, the assortment in the store is not very solid, there are many kinds of product ranges.

Here some of my picks from the assortment:

Wilmariina's products are illustrated with old images from different local places. I love the fact how the products have a stong sence of place and time in them.

Today I'm happy... I can't believe I waited so long!

  Leena Pousi's ceramic products are very beautiful: strong and sensitive at the same time.

The same idea as in these earrings was also used by one company on Lasipalatsi design markets. Old playing cards are also often used as product labels. 

These were the products I found to be some of the best in Huldan huvila's product range. There were also some not-so-attractive products to be sold there. Still the over all look of the products managed to be appeeling. However for a lifestyle store like this, a solid product range would be an asset in the small market, though it is a bit difficult to achieve if there are not many crafts makers to rent the space. Hopefully in the future Huldan huvila can develop their assortment to a more unified way for a more specific target group.

The events in Huldan huvila

Huldan huvila also arranges different kinds of events around the year. They have many different kinds of crafts courses where customers can get together and learn new carfts techiques. E.g. we heard that a Finnish tv show "Sisustusmatkalla Minnan kanssa" had been to Huldan huvila to shoot an episode where they dyed yarns in plant colours. I'm looking forward to see the episode once it comes out. Huldan huvila has also spent it's 2-years birthday party, had a yard flea market, and an opening of an art exhibition. Events are an important way to keep the store lively and vivid. And crafts courses are an important social event that can be also a part of slower lifestyle.

Second Foor

Some of the space on the second floor was unbuilt and ready to be renovated, but some was already free for use. There was a small painting exhibition by some amateur artists, but I'm sorry to say it was not too impessive.

I can see the potential in the second floor to be turned into use. It might be used e.g. as a place for a library and/or a book store with crafts books? Or there could be displayed materials for different kinds of crafts and a peaceful place to make crafts by yourself? Or maybe it could be used for an accommodation during the courses, or even as an Bed and Breakfast kind of quarters?

Development suggestions

What I would develop in Huldan huvila was first of all the entrance and the yard. The entrance should always be well taken care of since it is the place where the first impression is been made. In Huldan huvila I think the lawn could have been a bit more tidy and what instantly caught my eye was that the flowers were all dead. It's better to have no flowers that dead flowers. And of course beautiful lively fresh yellow flowers would have made the entrance more appealing. The yellow flowers were seen on the "Open" ("Avoinna") sign on the door, so I think it would be nice to see then on the yard,too!

Also the entrance byt the door could be highlighted with plants, flowers or something that attracts customers.

Another thing that I noticed was that the products were sometimes a bit "hidden" inside the fixtures in the displays, they were not visible enough. And a customer cannot buy what he/she cannot see. In some places in the store I would pay more attention on the commerciality of the displays so the products could be better perceived by the customers.  I think it's OK to use more effective display methods alongside with the more attarctive display methods to gain more profits. All in all, I think that there were many excellent display ideas, but some of the displays still need a little clarification.

Dispite of these few small development suggestions, I think Huldan huvila was a great concept with lots of potential to grow. The interior, old furniture, location, events and the assortment all together make this an attractice slow life style store.