Meet the Ornamo Award ’24 Jury
The Ornamo Award ceremony is approaching! This year, we received an impressive number of nominations—84 in total. The winners, who will be announced in September at Helsinki Design Week, have been carefully selected by a jury composed of design professionals and industry stakeholders.
This year’s Ornamo Award jury included a distinguished panel of experts alongside Ornamo’s chairperson, Katja Soini. The jury featured Jonne Harju, Design Director at Nokia, Anna-Kaisa Huttunen, Director of Partnerships at Rester, Glass Artist Renata Schirm, Futurist Otto Tähkäpää, and Venture Capitalist Maria Wasastjerna. The guiding principle behind the jury’s decisions was this year’s timely theme: Innovations in Sustainable Development. According to the jury’s statement, all awardees represent novel approaches, solutions, or products that deliver new value and growth to the companies that develop and commercialize them. Additionally, the awardees offer solutions to societal and environmental challenges aligned with sustainable development goals.
The Ornamo Award is presented every other year to design professionals, groups, or companies recognized as leaders in the field, with themes that vary each year. In 2024, the awards will be given in two categories: Design Forerunner and Design Utilizer. In addition to the main award categories, the jury will also recognize one candidate with an Honorable Mention. Moreover, Ornamo will grant an Encouragement Award for a thesis in the field of design, with the recipient nominated by Aalto University.
The award ceremony will take place in September, where the jury will announce and invite the winners to the main stage at the Helsinki Design Week opening event.
JURY 2024
Katja Soini (Chair of the Jury)
Katja Soini works as the Director of Strategy and Sustainability at AFRY, one of Europe’s leading design and consulting firms. In her role, Katja creates new sustainable business opportunities in the built environment, focusing on customer-centric approaches and systemic change. Katja has held various leadership positions in business development in both large and boutique consulting firms, and she has over a decade of experience in research and teaching. Katja is the Chair of Ornamo’s Board and holds a degree in design as well as a Doctorate in Arts.
Jonne Harju
Jonne is an experienced product design professional with over two decades of experience across various design sectors. Currently, he serves as the Design Director at Nokia Design and works as an industrial designer at his own company, United Shapes of Finland Oy. Jonne passionately seeks out innovative new materials and technologies that can revolutionize hardware and product experiences. He brings a comprehensive understanding of product design to the jury.
Anna-Kaisa Huttunen
Anna-Kaisa has over 30 years of experience in leading design, innovation, and ecosystems in international companies. She is originally trained as a fashion designer. She has created and implemented various strategic projects for the renewal of product, service, and business concepts within companies, enhancing their ability to innovate and make strategic decisions based on foresight and creativity. Anna-Kaisa connects innovation management to complex sustainability challenges that require systemic changes. Currently, she is responsible for strategic partnerships at Rester, a company promoting textile circularity, and she builds new business ecosystems. She brings circular economy thinking, human-centered design, and the drive of growth companies to the Ornamo Award Jury.
Renata Schirm
Renata Schirm is an award-winning Finnish glass artist who works at the intersection of art and design, with a material-based approach. She has held numerous exhibitions both in Finland and abroad, and her works are included in public and private collections. Renata represents artistic perspectives in the jury, emphasizing the importance of our relationship with materials. She was awarded the Ornamo Design Award in 2018 for her innovation in industrially applicable form concrete.
Otto Tähkäpää
Otto Tähkäpää is an award-winning futurist, both domestically and internationally, who works as a foresight expert at Sitra. He believes that the future does not simply come or happen, but it is made and shaped every day. Otto is particularly interested in how future thinking and foresight can be used to imagine and build a better, planet-sized future. He also advocates for the expansion of future power, calling for broad-based societal discussions on what we hope our shared future will look like.
Maria Wasastjerna
Maria Wasastjerna (PhD) is a venture capital investor and managing partner at Kvanted Ventures. Kvanted invests in industrial technology startups across Northern Europe with a mission of accelerating industrial decarbonization. Before transitioning into venture capital, Maria worked as attorney and business lawyer for more than 15 years with technology, M&A, and digital markets, and her versatile experience spans across the corporate, regulatory and startup sector alike. With a PhD on digital markets, Maria is particularly interested in data-driven ventures and climate technology.