Lauri Greis’s Exhibition Gives New Life to Sportswear Through National Costumes

The exhibition also explores how Finns relate to clothing in general, especially to the much-debated "tuulipuku" (outdoor wear). The exhibition will be on show at the Craft Museum of Finland from 6 March to 18 October 2026.

The starting point for the fashion collection was the traditional national costume of a woman from Antrea, which Greis inherited from his grandmother. The collection is primarily a tribute to the artist’s late grandmother and her Karelian heritage. Elements of the Antrea national costume and its colour palette gave a concrete basis for the contemporary fashion pieces, and specific items like the tasselled "sykerö" headwear and striped apron particularly captured Greis’s interest.

In the exhibition outfits, technical materials meet traditional craft techniques and garments. The functions of the clothes have also been reimagined. Throughout the project, Greis aimed to deepen his understanding of Finnish national costume culture and find a credible and practical relationship between old and new. All garments in the exhibition are designed by Greis himself and made by him or his assistants. This, too, creates an intriguing interplay between the national costume and the industrially perceived outdoor wear.

The exhibition invites visitors to become enthusiastic about both national costumes and contemporary clothing, and to find something meaningful that resonates with all of us.

Lauri Greis

Lauri Greis is a Helsinki-based fashion designer known for blending traditional and modern elements in his work. The outfits in the Karelian Sportlore exhibition are part of his bachelor’s degree collection in Fashion from Aalto University, which has garnered both national and international attention. The combination of national costume and sportswear has been regarded as interesting and successful; the collection received the Fiskars Prize, the Konstsamfundet Prize, and the Finnish Textile and Fashion Award at Aalto University’s Näytös24 event. It also won an award in the ALPHA 2025 fashion competition for Nordic fashion schools.

His thesis was supervised by lecturer Elina Peltonen and overseen by Ilona Hyötyläinen, Head of Fashion Studies at Aalto University. Taina Kangas, national costume consultant at the National Costume Centre of Finland, acted as an adviser and introduced Greis to national costume culture and traditional garment making techniques.

More info
Marja Liisa Väisänen, curator, National Costume Centre of Finland, [email protected] or +358 50 311 8247