VALUE FOR EMERGING DESIGNERS
career OPPORTUNITIES THROUGH CONNECTIONS!
YFD is a design studio founded by designers and interior architects Heidi Maria Huovinen and Elisa Luoto. “Our mission is to bring emerging designers and businesses closer together and foster meaningful connections between them.”
Through initiatives such as design competitions, we bring designers and companies together around real business challenges. These encounters create opportunities for emerging designers to showcase their skills, connect with industry professionals and build relationships that can lead to future collaborations.
Left: Elisa Luoto, Heidi Maria Huovinen
ABOUT YFD DESIGN COMPETITIONS
We organise design competitions for emerging designers. Our goal is to showcase emerging Nordic talent across design disciplines, connect designers with businesses and create genuine opportunities for collaboration.
This is the kind of support we, as designers, would have appreciated during our studies and at the beginning of our careers.
— Heidi & Elisa, YFD founders and designers
We support and encourage you throughout each competition, helping you make the most of the experience. We organise online information sessions to cover key topics and help you move your work forward.
We also organise online and in-person events where you can meet key people from the companies participating in the competitions.
Our goal is for you to gain more from every competition than the chance to win: a deeper understanding of businesses, new professional connections and practical insights to help you develop your career.
Make the designer benefits more concreteReduce repetition around emerging designers
YFD founders. From left: Elisa Luoto and Heidi Maria Huovinen.
About YFD design competitions
More Than a Competition. A Step Towards Your Career.
A designer’s biggest challenge isn’t always a lack of skills. It’s getting the first clients.
For emerging designers, finding those first business clients can be difficult. You may have the talent and ideas, but without clients, it’s hard to build a portfolio of professional references — and without those references, finding the next client becomes even harder.
YFD connects designers with businesses
Young Finnish Design was founded to help bridge this gap.
We work with companies that are interested in collaborating with emerging designers and create curated design competitions around real business challenges. Three designers are selected for each competition.
This means you don’t have to start from scratch. We’ve already connected with a company that values emerging design talent and wants to explore what you could bring to their challenge.
Your first step towards a business relationship
YFD facilitates the process, creating direct connections between designers and companies. During the competition, you get to present your ideas, engage with company representatives and build a relationship with a potential client.
This is part of what we want to change in the Finnish design industry: emerging designers shouldn’t have to build their careers alone or struggle to reach businesses without existing connections.
The value goes beyond winning
A YFD competition offers more than a chance to win.
The winner receives a cash prize, which varies by competition. But the value can go much further: a first business client, a new portfolio reference, professional connections or an opportunity to continue working with the company after the competition.
A competition is not the destination. It’s a step forward.
YFD competitions are a way to get a seat at the table, demonstrate your skills and build relationships that can move your career forward.
The competition is not the end goal. It’s an opportunity to take the next step.
Connecting Designers and Businesses Through Meaningful Collaboration
YFD brings businesses and emerging designers together through impactful collaborations, including design competitions and design projects that bring design expertise into businesses.
We organise design competitions with open calls for designers. Applications are open to designers who graduated within the past 10 years.
We share open calls and updates on upcoming competitions through our channels: Instagram @youngfinnishdesign, LinkedIn @youngfinnishdesign, Facebook @youngfinnishdesign and our newsletter.
Here, you can also discover the designers who have taken part in our competitions and design projects, as well as the winners.
Advance Your Career with YFD!
The YFD Competition Mailing List is our primary channel for important competition updates, brief clarifications, online information sessions and new design opportunities. We only send content relevant to designers — no ads or unnecessary marketing.
Joining the mailing list is free for designers.
By subscribing, you’ll receive information about design competitions and other opportunities to advance your creative career.
We’re also building a network of designers that connects talent with real business needs. YFD maintains a designer database to identify suitable talent for different projects and share collaboration opportunities that match designers’ skills and expertise. We process professional information, such as design discipline, skills and portfolio, in accordance with our privacy policy.
You can also read the YFD Privacy Policy.