HDW Lab
HDW Lab is part of a two-year project by the City of Helsinki and
Helsinki Design Week aimed at making Helsinki’s city centre more vibrant and inviting.
Utilizing design thinking, the project examines the future of the city centre through two complementary perspectives. Streets and public spaces play a crucial role in how people move around, interact, and spend time downtown. Equally important is what happens inside the buildings: what kinds of services, experiences and novel retail concepts will draw people to the city centre in the future – and keep them coming back? HDW Lab turns these questions into a collaborative experiment. In workshops hosted on the second floor of the Lab, professionals will develop new solutions for both street-level and commercial spaces.
On the ground floor, citizens get their say: what activities, services and experiences should the city centre offer to give people more reasons to visit? To spark the conversation, selected urban life, business, and urban development experts will share their visions for the future of the city centre on video:
Aleksi Kuokka, Lead designer, Aivan
Arvind Ramachandran, Architect and Urban Planner
Laura Kolbe, Professor Emeritus of European History, University of Helsinki
Mari Vaattovaara, Professor of Urban Geography, University of Helsinki
Pauliina Louhiluoto, CEO, My o My
Pia Pakarinen, CEO, Helsinki Region Chamber of Commerce
Rikhard Manninen, Director of Land Use
The video work was produced and created by Marko Rantanen.
If you can’t visit HDW Lab, you can still share your thoughts on the development of Helsinki city centre by taking the survey below. By completing the survey, you’ll also have a chance to win a gift voucher for a stay at Hobo Hotel Helsinki, one of Helsinki Design Week’s partners.
HDW Lab isn’t looking for a single definitive answer to what the future city centre looks like. Instead, it gathers diverse perspectives, identifies new opportunities and generates ideas that can be carried forward into the next phases of the two-year project.
The results will be presented at Helsinki Design Week 2027.
