Kukkapuro, Yrjo

Yrjö Kukkapuro, a Finnish designer, born in Wyborg in 1933, studied at the Academy of Arts and Crafts in Helsinki, where he received his diploma in interior design in 1958. A year later, he established his studio in Kauniainen, where, strongly influenced by his teacher at the Academy, Ilmari Tapiovaara (born 1914), who pioneered the field of self-assembly furniture, he designed functional furniture. His Karuselli chair from 1965 was shaped after the imprint of the designer’s body in the snow. In 1978, he designed the Fysio office chair, the shape of which was determined by anthropometric data. From 1978 to 1980, Kukkapuro was a lecturer at the Helsinki Institute of Technology. With the rise of the 1980s, he began to design more expressively, influenced by postmodernism. His Experiment chairs (1982-1983) are a prime example. He himself declared, “Postmodernism has reconnected us with the vital element the French call Joie de vivre.”