Marimekko creative director talks collabs, stores and more

Rebekka Bay is creative director of Finnish fashion and homewares brand Marimekko. We spoke with her about Marimekko’s recent collaborations with the likes of Adidas and Ikea, how it puts a modern spin on unique prints from its archive and what the role of stores is in the future of the business. She also shares her highlights from her previous role as global creative director at Uniqlo, and what makes brands like Cos, Gap and Everlane so successful. 

Inside Retail: Marimekko does a lot of collaborations. In just the last few weeks, you’ve launched collections with the likes of Ikea, Adidas and the artist Landon Metz. What role do these collaborations play in the business? 

Rebekka Bay: Understanding that Marimekko originates from Finland, and we’re really expanding into the world now, we have identified collaborations as a great tool to position ourselves in different markets and with different consumers. 

We use collaborations in different ways. We have artist collaborations, and I always think about them as building the future of Marimekko. We have more than 70 years of heritage and an extensive print archive, but the artist collaboration series is very much a commitment to bringing new artworks and new prints into the archive. We launched Landon Metz last week, we worked with Virginie Hucher last year and we will be launching our collaboration with Sabine Finkenauer during Salone in Milan in April. 

But then we also have the big brand collaborations – Marimekko and Ikea, Marimekko and Adidas – and of course we look for brands that share our values, so brands that are inclusive, democratic, concerned with doing better or acting more responsibly, and brands that are also looking to bring joy to people’s everyday lives in the same way as Marimekko. 

We always look for a surprising or positive dynamic, or a positive contradiction maybe. There’s something Finnish in this idea of contradiction, where we have the long winter, but also the summer night. We have the happiest people in the world, but also the darkest environment for the majority of the year. Even in our collaborations, we are always trying to capture this positive contradiction.

IR: It’s so rare for a brand to have a significant archive of unique designs and prints. It’s really an asset in today’s retail landscape. Can you share how Marimekko uses its archive, but still tries to stay fresh and modern?

RB: You’re absolutely right – it is unique in this world to have such vast material. Since the beginning of Marimekko, on the edge of our printed textiles, we’ve written the name of the print and the print designer, so it’s almost as if we started building the archive before we knew that we would end up with this extensive archive, and we continue to do that. 

Our history is living with us. It’s very real, it’s something we can dive into every day. We use the archive for all our product categories – home, ready-to-wear, bags and accessories – and we start every season by looking back, but looking back to look forward. As wonderful as it is to have this extensive archive, there’s always the danger of resting on your laurels a little bit, or becoming what I call a museum brand. 

The way we work with our archive now is we decide on an overarching mood or theme that we would like to convey, such as minimalism or brutalism, and then we go back into our archive based on that idea, and we try to dig out prints – both iconic, recognisable prints and prints that we never use – then we start to pair them with new prints. We have a portfolio of print designers in Helsinki with whom we do ongoing work, so we can create a very specific brief, or we can create a vague brief and let them propose something to us. 

And then we have the artist collaborations as the cherry on top, where we really are concerned with protecting the integrity of the artist’s work and, therefore, we allow them to propose artwork to us and we work around it, whether that means draping new dress shapes, or finding new materials and new ways of cutting the fabric. 

IR: Are there any collaborations that Marimekko has done that stand out to you as particularly unique or interesting?

RB: I have to say that I think they’re all unique, and working with collaborators is like being in a candy store for someone like me. It’s so intriguing to work with brands with different skill sets from ours, and having the opportunity to apply the art of printmaking to categories outside the ones that we own ourselves. 

We just launched the Bastua collaboration with Ikea, which is concerned with bath culture or sauna culture, where we looked at the similarities and differences in bath culture across the globe. That was extremely intriguing – to work with a brand that has the reach and the scale of Ikea, and to be able to develop new prints for that collaboration. That was a first for us. Normally, our collaborator brands are looking for something very recognisably Marimekko.

IR: Do you have any tips for brands that might be considering doing a collaboration, but don’t have as much experience in this space as Marimekko? 

RB: My tip would be to enter into collaborations in a collaborative spirit, always. It’s very easy for collaborations just to be on the surface, but I think what truly makes a strong collaboration is when the sum of the parts is bigger than two – when what you create together is something you could never create alone.

It’s not a secret that collaborations can help you reach new audiences. They can help position you in a market where you have less brand awareness and open up new wholesale doors, so there are many benefits. But to be successful, there must be real substance in the collaboration. 

IR: As the creative director of Marimekko, what would you say is the biggest opportunity for the brand right now?

RB: There are many opportunities. We’ve been really concerned with modernising the brand, and learning how to become as relevant outside of our home market as we are within it. There’s a huge opportunity for us to establish ourselves in a global marketplace. We opened our new New York store back in December, and we are looking at our key city strategy. What are the most important cities for us to be in? 

We have home, ready-to-wear, bags and accessories, and we have the opportunity to play up one more than the other. In some markets, we have been more recognised for our home product, but now as we have really strengthened the ready-to-wear collections, we are using them as our spearhead, and it’s having a halo effect on our bags and accessories. So we have this opportunity that very few brands have, though, I’ll be honest, at times, it’s also an obstacle. It’s like, what is this brand? But I think this is our biggest opportunity now at a global scale.

IR: Can you tell me more about the New York store? What does it look like? Where is it? What was the thinking behind it?

RB: We have been in New York for many years, but our lease ended in our previous location, and we searched hard and long to find the ideal location for us. We opened on Wooster Street in SoHo in lower Manhattan back in December. And the reason I love to talk about the store is that we opened with a new concept.

We developed a new concept that we’ve been piloting over the last year and a half in Copenhagen. The working title for the Copenhagen store was Marimekko Creative, and the working title for New York is Work in Progress, so it can continue to evolve and change based on the feedback that we hear from our community.

The concept is a very simple grid system that we can hang things from – shelves and garments – and we can change it, so we have a space that is flexible enough for us to be category-focused or collection-focused. We can empty out the space and put big tables down the middle, where we can host dinners. It allows us to become a destination for experiences, learning, sharing or dialogue.

IR: Are you planning to roll out this new store concept anywhere else? And what other global cities are at the top of your list? 

RB: We are searching for a permanent space in Copenhagen. That will be like the New York store 2.0. We’re also refitting our Stockholm store, again using the lessons from New York. 

We have also identified the most important cities for us now, and, of course, New York is one of them; Copenhagen is one of them, due to Copenhagen Fashion Week’s commitment to sustainability and because the city is very much becoming the hub for the Scandinavian or North European market. Tokyo also continues to be really important for us.

And then there’s another tier of cities when we start to look out into the world, especially Southeast Asia. I really want Sydney on the map as well, because I think there’s so much opportunity for us in Australia.

IR: It sounds like you’ve decided that stores are going to be an important part of the business moving forward? 

RB: We’re really concerned with intangible experiences, but I still believe that the customer wants a physical space for these intangible experiences. As much as Marimekko is comfortable living in a digital space, we are very much concerned with the craft of the art of printmaking. For me, Marimekko has always been as recognisable for [the look of] its print as [for its feel] in the hand, so I think a physical space is important to create a true brand experience. But I think the role of a physical space has changed from this very commercial focus to something that is more about creating value or giving back to the community or hosting your community.

IR: Prior to joining Marimekko, you were Uniqlo’s global creative director. Can you share some of the highlights from that time? Are there any cool projects that you worked on? 

RB: In my role at Uniqlo, I was overseeing colour and future concepts, so I was trying to identify shifts in what consumers wanted, both aesthetically AND in terms of their changing lives. Besides creating all the concepts and colour palettes for the Uniqlo brands, I was also handling projects where we were literally looking at defining the future of the wardrobe. What does a world look like where we don’t stitch garments anymore, or where we don’t have access to natural fibres? 

I worked with a team in New York and with the headquarters in Tokyo, but also really closely with different mills, on coming up with new materials and new ways of handling materials.

IR: You’ve also worked at Gap, Everlane, and Cos. These are brands that people in all different markets would immediately recognise. Looking back at your time across these different businesses, are there any common success factors that stand out that you think enabled them to become global brands?

RB: I very much believe good design can make people’s lives better, and I think what these brands have in common is that they’re concerned with creating good design of high quality for a democratic audience. 

With Cos, I think we identified the shift to a more minimal, pared-down aesthetic that was not available at an accessible price point at the time. We worked with the best architects, the best graphic designers and the best stylists, and we managed to create a positioning that was only in luxury at the time. I helped build the architecture of the brand, and I still look back at my time there with gratitude and humbleness because of the people I got to work with. 

With Gap, I went there because it was always the inspiration for what I did at Cos. Being so category-driven and really owning the category – owning denim, owning chinos, owning the T-shirt – I think there’s something around trying to take out the complexity of a brand. I’m not going to comment on where Gap is today, but maybe they lost a little bit of that. 

When I joined Everlane, it was to expand the product portfolio and build a design team. I think their real strength is in communication, so again, a very direct and bold style of communication, and taking out complexity. It’s interesting because I had worked in fashion for many years when I joined Everlane, but it really changed my perspective on building collections.

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