Iitala Factory of Helsinki

In every Finnish home you will most likely find a large assortment of high quality glass products with a little 'Iitala' emblem on the side. Finns take pride in their own country, and this is reflected in there love and appreciation of glassware products made by the Finnish company of Iitala. I had seen many products over the summer in homes that I had visited, as well as in department stores I browsed through, and for a great opportunity for a closer look into the art, design, and craftsmanship behind the products our last event for the FUSYE Helsinki program was a special trip and guided tour to the Iitala factory in the city of Arabica, neighboring Helsinki.
Iitala followed suit with with many companies in Finland with an outlook into modern style and design. The general offices and entrance areas were very modern, specially designed to emphasize simplicity and the glassware itself ( which led my observations to the fact that many of the office cubicles were like glass cases - interesting).

With our tour guide we were taken further than the front of the headquarters and were able to see all the steps to the final Iitala products behind the scenes. Inside the back floors we were led to many machines rotating with wet ceramics being filed and shaped down to size.

For glasses and mugs, handles were put on sub-manually with each one having to be assisted by a manhandled machine. Albeit expensive, you could tell that you were paying for quality, care, and precision when buying an Iitala product when seeing how much effort was put into the production in the factory.

From the background knowledge of the tour guide we learned about the philosophies of efficiency and top quality of Iitala. They make many precautions to not waste materials and also have high standards when selecting which products are acceptable for sales.

Another floor consisted of the kiln which was an enormous oven that baked the products into their final states. It was definitely a little warmer on that floor. Outside on the cooling racks were crates upon crates of thousands of plates, glasses and mugs. It was incredible.

We also learned how images were screened onto the mugs which was the same set up for the famous Muumi mugs which are one of the most popular products of the company.

After the tour of the back factory area of the home-goods quarters we were led to the presentation room for the remainder of the tour. The room was very large and well lit, modern of course, and really presented the whole collection of Iitala products very well.

While looking around we learned about the history of the company and the thought process around the product's designs.

Many of the glass products came in a variety of colors, and for that reason, a variety of prices, since different colors required more precision and time to get it just right ( deep red was the most difficult to create apparently, making it a much higher price than, say, clear or blue). There was also a whole table dedicated to the timeless Aalto vase which is the classic design by architect Alvar Aalto.

The design may seem a little weird, but once you see it in its element in a well furnished, modern Finnish home, it really looks spectacular - and you do see these in pretty much every Finnish house!


Many of us really enjoyed viewing the collections put together since they all complemented each other very well. After touring around we had an opportunity to shop at the factory's store and pick out some Iitala classics for ourselves as last minute souvenirs since we were already past being in Finland for less than 24 hours.

After our tour and shopping excursion, we all were very excited and adrenalin rushed since we only had hours remaining in our summer living in Finland.