Ahlström Krister

Krister Ahlström, vuorineuvos (honorary title), industrialist and design activist, is a prominent figure in Finnish business. He worked for Wärtsilä for 15 years before joining the family-owned company A. Ahlström as head of central administration in 1981. The following year, he was appointed President of the company. Ahlström led the company until 1998 and has since been Vice Chairman of the Boards of Stora Enso and Fortum, among others.

Ahlström is known as an enthusiastic advocate of Finnish design and is active in promoting design in Finnish society and industry. He has successfully put the lessons of design management into practice and applied them innovatively in the development of business strategies. Ahlström played a key role in building national design policy and has chaired several design projects. Ahlström is also an especially important person for the birth of Design Archives. He was the driving force behind the project to establish the archive, and thanks to the extensive background work done by Ahlström and industrial designer Jorma Pitkonen, Design Archives was quickly up and running.

The material donated by Ahlström includes documents on his work for Finnish design. The material is mainly from 1998-2010, a period when Ahlström was a major influence on the discovery of new tracks and methods in Finnish design, and when design became part of Finland’s innovation system. It was also during this period that the foundations were laid for the School of Art and Design to become a respected part of the new Aalto University. Here you can find the catalogue of Krister Ahlström’s archive.