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This exhibition showcases Master’s Theses 2024-2025 from the Department of Architecture, all graded excellent. The works represent the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, interior architecture and urban studies and planning. 

Aalto University’s Department of Architecture educates professionals that make an impact in the intersection of technology and art, with a strong understanding of social, cultural, environmental and economic implications of their work. With creative exploration, transdisciplinary collaboration as well as contextual and critical thinking, the Aalto graduates are building a socially responsible and sustainable future.

Image: Nhung Pham's thesis addresses the adaptability of housing through game methods. 

Addressing complex sustainability challenges, such as climate crisis, loss of biodiversity, and other socio-ecological disturbances call for new mindsets and skills. In alignment with this call, the School of Arts, Design and Architecture, the School of Business, and the School of Chemical Engineering jointly organise the Creative Sustainability programme.

 The Creative Sustainability Graduate Show presents a range of interdisciplinary projects offering critical and creative approaches towards understanding and addressing sustainability challenges through a variety of media and formats. The systemic and transformative visions of these projects focus on the world's current sustainability issues and offer glimpses into just, resilient and desirable futures. 

Image from Niilo Tenkanen's mobile urban furniture that are free to use on campus. These chairs are the perfect antithesis to 'hostile design' (hostile design refers to design choices that prevent unwanted people from using the city). Photo: Anne Kinnunen

Step through the portal and get to know thesis projects from both Master's and Bachelor’s graduates in Visual Communication Design (VCD). The exhibition invites you to explore topics ranging from visual identities and interfaces to artistic explorations as well as speculative and strategic approaches.

This year’s theme is ‘Portals’. A portal symbolizes a threshold — a passage between realities, dimensions or states of being. The graduates are stepping through their own portal into the world that awaits them. The audience, in turn, is invited to step into the visual worlds the talented Aalto VCD graduates have created.

Image from Linnea Sjöholm's installation in letterpress 'Fragments of...' Photo: Anne Kinnunen 

Four Master's level Costume Design graduates 2025 showcase their work. The works cover dance costumes, film costumes and costumes from a theatre performance done within an inclusive and accessible design process. 

Aalto University’s degree programme ‘Costume Design: Performing Arts and Film’ at the Department of Film is the only one of its kind in Finland. The programme nurtures future professionals for the theatre, film, media and creative industries. Costume professionals work on issues of representation, characters’ personalities and motivations, and contribute to shaping new dramaturgies. The strength of exceptional costume design lies in its connection to storytelling and emotional resonance. 

Image from 'Livsfarligt på allvar!' (2024), a collaboration between Svenska Teatern, DuvTeatern, Uniarts Helsinki’s Theatre Academy (TeaK), Acting in Swedish (TeaK) and Aalto ARTS costume design major. Costume design by Meri Craig. Photo: Cata Portin

A selection of both Bachelor’s and Master’s student films made in 2024-2025 by Aalto University’s ELO Film School. 

ELO Film School's task is to provide students with guidance, space and tools to help them find their own voice and artistic style. At the same time, film education has an important national task. The education is aimed at improving the technical, artistic and substantive quality of Finnish films and television programmes, while also promoting the success of domestic films in the everchanging international market.

Image: still from Helmi Donner's film 'The Lightning Rod / Matalapaine', which premiered in La Cinef 2025, the official section of the Cannes Film Festival for short films made in film schools. 

This exhibition is a tribute to the work of animation artists. Through this magical artform, the lifeless comes to life and continues to enchant generation after generation of viewers. Aalto University’s Masters programme in Animation is the first of its kind in Finland, and its graduates are key actors in a wide network of national and international animation professionals. This exhibition presents a compilation of projects carried out over the past 4 years.

 Animations are seen everywhere. At Aalto, students are not only engaging with different audiences but also testing the boundaries of animation, drawing reference to contemporary, personal, social, ethical, cultural and environmental issues. Animation has its fantastic ways to communicate complicated themes. Animation artists use various techniques, from handmade to computer generated, with a creative mind. Animation celebrates imagination!

Image: still from Veera Lamminpää's animation short 'Fish River Anthology / Mereneläviä'.

The exhibition Unheimliche Dinge / Uncanny things focuses on the unknown in artistic practice and research, and invites to imagine the not-yet-known at the intersection of artistic, pedagogical and theoretical knowledge. The Art Education MA graduates’ works bring to view questions of the inexplicable, imagining, identities, and experiences of belonging or not belonging.

 Aalto University’s Art education major is a central agent in art education in Finland and plays a prominent role in the international arena. The studies focus on the potential of art education to build a sustainable future. Artistic practice and visual cultural phenomena are examined in relation to ecological, ethical, social, technological and interdisciplinary issues. 

Image: detail from Hannah Hamberg 'The last of its kind / Lajinsa viimeinen' (2025)

Meet some young talents, who are redefining the future of games and gaming! This exhibition is showcasing a selection of finalised Master's theses as well as some works in progress, all from the Game Design and Development programme. The diverse compilation of works demonstrates that the world of games and gaming culture is flourishing — offering virtually unlimited possibilities and potential.    

Gaming excels at interactivity and audiovisual storytelling as well as creating atmospheres and exciting new aesthetics. But beyond the confines of the entertainment-oriented digital gaming industry exists also a thriving culture that employs games in different contexts. Could we expand our understanding of what games are capable of?

This exhibition focuses on design's role in society. The works on display push the boundaries of industrial design towards interaction design, service design, co-design and other emerging fields, where design activities can enhance the quality of people’s lives but also make an overall positive impact.

In their Master’s theses, CoID students are presenting novel approaches and key practices needed in design innovation. But they are also exploring the new roles of the designer in industry and society at large.