Mikko Laakkonen

Industrial designer Mikko Laakkonen focuses mainly on furniture that is typically multipurpose and strives for functionality. One of the key factors in his work is always bearing in mind how the user will utilise the object and to what kinds of needs the design responds to. As an esthetical principle in finding his way to functionality, he uses two leading thoughts: “considered chaos” and “logical order.”

The first one, the idea of considered chaos, comes from nature. Considered chaos can be found in the seemingly arbitrary but internally orderly fashion the birds’ nests and beavers’ dams are constructed. One of Laakkonen’s best-known designs, the coat rack called Latva, carries out this philosophy with its close resemblance of a branchy tree. The protruding branches seem unorganized, but actually they form a harmonic entity.

The other central theme in Laakkonen’s work, logical order, refers to a structure consisting of several objects that form a larger material presence. Laakkonen brings about this conceptual idea in his designs paying attention to rhythm and sequence. Laakkonen’s Vasu shelf/container system designed for Italian brand Covo and magazine cases designed for Inno are inspired by this theme.

Laakkonen does not see the two themes as conflicting, but wants to rather think they support each other. “Even if they seem to be opposing when you fist look at them, I think there are many mutual interfaces, in which the themes unite and mix,” the designer says.

 www.mikkolaakkonen.com