Today I took an almost-4 hour bus ride to Rauma, which is a small town west of Helsinki on the coast. I was mainly interested in going there because the core of the town is a UNESCO heritage site (Old Rauma), which consists of a preserved wooden town! Another reason is because Rauma is known for its bobbin lace-making. There’s actually a lace-making festival that happens in the town, but that unfortunately didn’t line up with the timing of my trip.
When I arrived in Rauma around 11:30am, I wanted to grab lunch first. I have a habit of forgetting to eat when I get really absorbed in things so it’s better to preemptively take care of it. I went to a bakery I found recommended in a guidebook as a local institution called Kontion Leipomo, which has been around for 50 years. I got a sandwich and a dessert there. I actually didn’t mean to order this sandwich but nobody really spoke English and my miming was apparently inaccurate and I was given the sandwich next to the one I actually wanted. Which turned out to be hard boiled eggs and pickles. But that was okay, I like both those things! The dessert I had was a cute little strawberry cake with a custard between the layers. I was hoping to try a more traditional Finnish baked good, but they didn’t really have that type of thing on offer. I got to sit and read a book and eat and it was really nice to be at a more “local” place instead of a touristy location so I could people chatting around me in Finnish and meeting up with friends.
After that, I walked down into town. The first place I stopped in at was Pyhän Ristin kirkko, or Church of the Holy Cross. It has frescoes that date back to the 1500s, and you can see a bit of that below! I didn’t get a good photo of the exterior of the church because it’s so big and not elevated, and there are lots of lovely trees around it that make it difficult for short old me to get a good angle. But there are lots online if you want a peek.
I walked further into town, and the buildings were so beautiful! I especially liked the red flowers in the window box below. Another thing I’ve noticed in Finland so far is that they don’t really have separate street signs. All of the street names are on the corners of the buildings near the intersections instead! As well, “katu” at the end of the name means “street”; it’s a similar thing to “Main Street”, except the words just get combined. I found it hard to tell where the boundaries of Old Rauma were, because I have my phone on airplane mode and couldn’t check a map. Plus, it honestly doesn’t really matter anyway!
The main square (kauppatori) had lots of restaurants and seating areas, as well as a building with a clock tower. I found a lot of the sight-seers seemed to stay very close to this square and didn’t venture far off. Most people seemed focussed on going to restaurants and shopping, and a lot of the side streets were completely deserted (which was good for photo-taking!). I stopped in a few shops, and ended up falling in love with this pale purple linen shirt that I ended up buying because I couldn’t stop thinking about it!
Rauma has a free museum called Tammela, and it’s a small estate within the city that has a main house and multiple outbuildings. The employees’ offices are right inside rooms that are also on display in the house, which I thought was really sweet and welcoming. They have cool cutouts on the walls showing various old stages of the house. It’s mainly focussed on renovating and recycling materials, which I found really interesting. For example, the photo directly below shows a cutaway displaying the old, MUCH-lower location of the top of the door frame – the floor used to be much lower as well.
In Rauma, all (or most) of the houses have names, which are displayed on white oval plates on the sides of the buildings. The museum had an exhibit of a sampling of these types of signs. And the craziest part was the wallpaper cutaway! Over the period from 1900 to 1960, fifteen different wallpapers were used in one room! All of them are on display below, showing how they were layered over each other as time went on.
The next museum I went to cost a small amount (because I’m still technically a student – milking that for as long as possible), and is called Marela. It’s the former home of a rich Rauman and has all of the family’s belongings on display! Not all of the signs had English translations, so I’m not entirely clear of the whole story, but I got the impression that the former owner was a really adventurous guy who travelled a lot and collected scientific specimens of creatures he encountered along the way. You can see his suitcase and some of these samples below.
Next, I stopped by Pits-Priia, a lace shop that also has an artisan in the shop demonstrating bobbin lace-making! I watched for a bit, and she was using loads of bobbins and moving them around under and over each other in a way that suggested she knew exactly what each one was doing. I have NO idea how she was keeping track of all of them, because they were not labeled (that I could see). Then, she would pin certain junctions down to the base she was using, and continue. The pattern was printed on a paper underneath where she was working, so she was shaping her work to that pre-arranged design. I was unclear what anchors the junctions once the pins are removed and the lace comes off the form. Does anyone have any insight on this? Regardless, it was super cool and really awesome to see a traditional art like that being celebrated. There were lots of samples of lace available for sale in the shop, one example is below.
After exiting the lace shop, I headed back toward the bus station to get food and sit and read a bit. I over-budgeted the amount of time I’d need to explore Rauma by about 90-120 minutes, so I had some extra time to kill. On the way back, I took more photos of local buildings and wandered aimlessly a bit. Luckily I had offline maps downloaded onto my phone of the area, so I wasn’t too concerned about getting seriously lost.
On the way, I stopped in a crafty/hobby shop in Old Rauma. They had a great selection of notions, included an awesome array of D-rings and clips and other bag-making supplies, and even had stone-washed linen for sale! I was sooo tempted by its soft buttery goodness, but I ended up exhibiting restraint since I’d already bought the linen shirt earlier.
Last but not least, in a completely random occurrence, there happened to be a fabric store RIGHT ACROSS FROM THE BUS STATION. How does this happen?! It’s called Jätti-Rätti, which Fanni said is a funny name and is sort of Finnish wordplay (but I can’t really explain it), and they had an amazing selection of garment fabrics! They sold really fun bias-tapes by the kilogram, some scuba knits for 8€/m, a great colour selection of beautiful bamboo jerseys, a full wall of coating fabrics, AND a whole shelving unit of ribbed knits in many different colours! I didn’t end up getting anything, but it was fun to look and a good way to eat up some of my extra time. They also had an impressive array of horsehair ribbon, which I was really tempted to get some of and make all of my skirts the MOST voluminous, but I knew it would get crushed and crumpled in my luggage, so I held off.
Finally, I stopped in at Hesburger, which is basically Finland’s McDonald’s and has 250+ locations in Finland. My review: I like the fries better at McDonald’s, but the cheeseburger was pretty good and definitely more substantial than a McDonald’s patty. (This is important information, my friends.)
Tomorrow I’m headed to Turku on the western coast (actually drove through it today on the bus), staying overnight there, and then the day after heading on a ferry to the Åland islands off the coast of Finland (apparently a lot of people speak Swedish there instead of Finnish) where I’ll be biking to a B&B and staying over night. So I’ll catch up with you all on Friday after I return!