Recently in Helsinki Category

Over the past hundred years, Finland has emerged as a world capital of design, creating furniture, toys, electronics, clothing, jewelry, and household items that embody the country's uniquely modern sensibilities. An excellent overview of the style can be found at the Helsinki Design Museum, which has more than 35,000 objects that represent the best of 20th and 21st century Finnish design. The Finnish aesthetic is captured perfectly in everyday objects such as a 1941 Paavo Tynell table lamp, a 1951 set of colorful stacking glasses from Saara Hopea, and a 1965 Haimi Karuselli chair (pictured) by legendary Finnish furniture designer Yrjö Kukkapuro. While many of the pieces in the museum have a decidedly futuristic quality to them, you'll find several that provide a glimpse of the style's roots in the national Romantic Movement of late 1800's and early 1900's, which made people take a second look at the country's growing industrial landscape and think about ways to make it more pleasing to the eye. The museum is less than one kilometer away from the Hotel Kämp, a member of Starwood's Luxury Collection and itself an example of exquisite Finnish design.

Helsinki, home of the Hotel Kamp, is a beautiful city. It's also one that is ahead of the tourism curve. The local tourist authority is offering the services of free personzlied tours by English-speaking guides called City Sherpas. Guests are invited to choose a City Sherpa they feel is right for them (they range in age from their twenties to their sixties and offer specialites as diverse as punk-rock record shopping, long distance hiking and ballroom dancing advice. Helsinki even offers a City Sherpa blog with testimonials from visitors, local information and plenty of pictures.

Helsinki is a gorgeous, walkable city with hundreds of sidewalk cafes, beautiful summer weather and a hotspot for experimental architecture. Oh... and at this time of year, it's sunny 20 hours a day. All of these are good enough reasons for the New York Times to report on Helsinki's Shining Season without resorting to the usual cliches of tall blondes, Nokia and vodka. Yes the Helsinki trip more often than not requires the dreaded Frankfurt transfer, if flying from the Americas or the UK. However, it is one heck of a place, if just for the emerging gastropub scene alone. The Times recommends staying at the Hotel Kämp (pictured), a Luxury Collection hotel that they call "the obvious first choice, if you can afford it."