The BOTH cross-diciplinary art and design team hit Turku as a part of the Turku 2011 Cultural Capital Year.

Together with our in-house artist Eeva Kaisa Berry we concepted this project, which consisted of 15 thousand onion flowers planted in three locations around Turku with the local residents.

The planting sessions in fall 2010 were grand. Lots of kids running around, hot juice, Finnish pulla and ample of sunshine available. We made lots of new friends, which is something you rarely get when you work with a Mac. Thanks for taking part, everybody!

We got some nice media coverage, too.

The onion bulbs will bloom when the snow melts in the spring 2011.They will form big, positive messages such as “Olet kaunis!” (you’re beautiful!), “Ajattelen sinua” (thinking of you) and “Pussataan” (let’s kiss), which is our favorite. The canvas was free, and everyone was encouraged to slip in their own personal message in the heat of the night. We’ll see if anybody did.

The onion bulbs were donated by Huiskula Oy, an importer of quality flowers. The project has been granted help also from Uudenmaan taidetoimikunta, Grafia and Varsinais-Suomen Kulttuurirahasto. Thanks for taking part!

For us this piece is all about getting back on your feet after a gray winter, claiming your streets -attitude, and remembering that life does not suck. Usually.

This is a detail of the Jyrkkälä flowers in the spring of 2011.

And this is the overview of the Jyrkkälä site.  Quite a romantic location, don’t you say? The trail leads to the bus-stop.

Kaisa giving advice to kids at Jyrkkälä in fall 2010. Not that they needed much supervising, they were very precise with their bulb math.

The Jyrkkälä planting sessions had the greatest atmosphere; kids with and without parents taking part. Anna and Andy were some of the first ones to come and the last ones to leave.

Kiril and Fedja marking a planted square. The red ink ran away with the first rain.

Leakaarina planting in Vasaramäki park. The “O” in Olet kaunis was be the best one around.

At the end of the day Liisa was one of our last volunteers to leave the site. Liisa posing in front of the almost-ready  Puolalanpuisto piece, which will be the most easily reached piece of the three. Unfortunately nature took its unpredictable course, and the Puolalanmäki piece was the weakest bloomer. Someone please tell us why.