It does not have to be a touristic spot to visit. I love walking in the flower shops / greenhouses and this one looks so special. Viherkäine OY has design products for home, antiques, flowers, trees and sometimes there is a café corner.

A local couple with a gardening background, Kari and Kirsi Sjöroos , found a nice onion field in the Rauma city center. They bought the premises and turned the greenhouses into a shop in 1988.  They opened a company called Viherkäine OY, which means “green” in Rauma language.

They offer gardening services to private and business clients. Their machinery clean the city roads. The retail side is just a side business and hence it does look quiet in there. I hope they get more customers now that the post packages can be collected from there.

And I just walk there and wonder like Alice in Wonderland. Where am I? Is it ok to walk here without buying anything 🙂

You see two sculptures of the local Rauma artist Kerttu Horila in the following gallery.
The company website

He was smart and she was pretty. Rafael Lönnström was asked to move his ammunition factory further away from Helsinki in 1930ies. He chose Rauma. Far enough (from Russia), but not too far from civilization. His wife Teresia could take shopping trips from Turku to Stockholm.

After the war, the main focus of operations shifted to water fixtures, and the Lönnström companies developed into a major player in metal industry in Rauma. Their factories used half of the electricity produced in Rauma! Remember, electricity came in 1900 and there wasn’t enough of it.

Rafael Lönnström died from illness in 1943 and Teresia managed the business another 30 years. She sold her share to the huge Huhtamaki Group business, which ten years later sold it further on.  The current successful water fittings factory Oras and BHW waste management companies in Rauma had a boost from this business deal.

As the business flourished, the company built housing for its workers around the factory (incl. 5 two-storey houses on Syväraumankatu Street and 7 white wooden houses known today as Weekday Houses).

Teresia and Rafael Lönnström Home Museum on Syväraumankatu 41 in Rauma. Website

More about the business history: 1930ies ->; 1950ies->

The way they met was romantic, but it’s another story. Go see their home and you still feel their presence.

She adopted her sister’s daughter, who worked as an accountant for the company. She died only a few years after Teresia. They traveled abroad, loved photography and collecting arts. She left huge funds to the Finnish Cultural Foundation and the Foundation for Economic Education.

You have seen the human like sculptures in Rauma .. woman with a handbag sitting in front of the Art Museum, three women swimming in the channel, the lady reading a bible at the church .. and so many more places. One is hidden behind a fence. I show this at my tour.

But now during this lace week you can see so much more as she opens her yard and studio to the public! Definitely go visit her place at Länsikatu 7 in old Rauma . She might even be sitting on her terrace.

It’s not just figures. They have fantastic expressions! Modern and surprising. A little bit theatrical.

I only saw one price tag, so I guess she does not sell any of her work these days and hence her studio is usually closed.

Kerttu Horila’s CV