By Marjo Ahonen

The cultural history and other possible meanings of Finnish folk “ryijy” or rya have attracted a great deal of public interest following recent flea market discoveries, and the publicity they have attracted aroused wild interest in other folk-like ryas as well. In this article, we share the story of Finnish folk rya. This article is based on the Craft Museum of Finlands’ 2007 rya publication Ryijy esillä [Ryijy in the collections of the Craft Museum of Finland]. We highlight the meanings that have been explored in material for which information on ownership or use is no longer available. 

The Craft Museum of Finland’s rya collections are based on ryas collected in the early 20th century, and which were born from the tradition of castle rya. They are covers and bridal ryas made by unknown peasant women, mainly during the golden age of rya weaving in Western Finland from 1770 to 1850. The collection of these weavings was linked to the national spirit of the period.

The Craft Museum of Finland has a collection of around 40 folk ryas, which were collected when the museum was founded and in its early decades. Lauri Mäkinen (from 1920 Kuoppamäki), an advocate of the home industry idea and the first museum director, assembled a collection of ryas for the State Handicraft Museum at a time when the national rya was elevated to the status of a national treasure. One of the results of this development was the publication in 1924 of U.T. Sirelius’s first study on folk rya, which was followed by a huge interest in rya in our country.

In the early 2000s, the old collection of the State Handicraft Museum was studied as part of a large-scale collection and storage project, the results of which were presented in the exhibition Ryijykuume! The museum’s old State Handicraft Museum-era rya were analysed both in terms of weaving techniques and cultural as well as historical features and placed in their regional and historical context. The materials, size and shape of the weavings reveal the cultural history of textiles and crafts at different times, while the composition, symbols and colouring of the patterns give an indication of the use of the weavings at different times, in different contexts. 

The cultural history of rya

Purpose and use changed appearance

The earliest rya were simple and undecorated. The pile was long and was tied on one side only. In a bed, the pile side was turned down and the plain side was the upper side of the rya. When used in this way, rya was a very warm blanket. In the Finnish archipelago, the tradition of the so-called boat rya continued almost unchanged for a long time.

The use of the rya gradually changed from a coverlet to a 19th century bridal and dowry rya as well as a decorative rya to be kept on the wall. At the same time, design of the pile became more complicated, with the use of various symbols and surface ornamentation. Peasant weavers, however, did not use weaving patterns, but composed their weavings according to their own recollections about the pattern. Regional stylistic features can therefore also be discerned in vernacular weaving. Places and regions close to the coast and cities were more exposed to new influences and to changes in style and fashion.

The most traditional type is represented by the reticulated weavings, which are woven with both rectangular and diagonal designs. In Finland, the most common national rya pattern is the diagonal weave, which is directly descended from the castle rya. The so-called scattered diamond weaves are those in which the grid pattern has disappeared, leaving meshes with visible fillings: diamonds, crosses, brides, crowns, hearts, and floral patterns such as stylised tulip petals, vases, and tree motifs. In Central Finland and parts of the Häme, the frame of the ryas widened to include a variety of motifs, such as flowering vines, spotted stripes, checkerboards and hexagons. In the later phase, the diamond pattern disperses and transforms into an even, small cloth-like pattern.

The early days of rya circa 1300-1770 

The different phases of weaving and cultural history have many meanings when looking at folk rya. In the Viking Age, rya was brought to Finland via Scandinavia, and in a cultural-historical sense, Finnish rya is a West Finnish textile, originally from the coastal regions. The oldest ryas were blankets, used as a cover in a boat, bed or sleigh, simple and undecorated. In the islands and along the waterways, the rya was a standard item of traveller’s equipment.

By order of King Gustav Vasa, ryas began to be listed in property inventories and hereditary records from the mid-15th century onwards; they could also be used as means of payment and taxes could be paid partly in ryas.

In the large rooms of stone-built royal palaces and manor houses, ryas were used on the sleeping lounges along the walls of the rooms. Blankets with thick piles to ward off the cold were the lifeblood of sleepers. Ryas made in narrow looms were joined with several seams to make a wide blanket, and up to four people could sleep side by side under one blanket.

A rya was also a commodity or an object of personal possession given to a soldier of the Crown to carry with him on his travels. When the army was at its strongest, weaving was at its most productive. As times became more peaceful, the weaving of rya also declined.

There was very little decoration and colouring in the blanket ryas, initially only white and brown sheep’s wool was used. Patterns were limited to the edges or ends of the rya, which were decorated with stripes, squares and borders using different coloured pile. In castle ryas, the pile surface could also be decorated with simple dice patterns or coloured stripes. Inventory lists and bailiff accounts show that the use of coloured pile was sometimes used for the ryas of the nobility. Sometimes they might also be knotted with the owner’s coat of arms. As the use of different plant dyes became more common, so did the use of patterning, with the introduction of rectangular and diagonal decorations and various types of meandering decorative borders. On the plain side, the surface of the cloth was decorated with coloured stripes and a patterned binding on the base fabric.

The ryas were made by professional weavers in the castles’ own workshops or under the auspices of the crown estates. Apparently, Finnish weaving was already acquiring its own special characteristics, as the ryas made here were worthy of the court and were priced higher than those made in Sweden. King Gustav Vasa paid special attention to Finnish weaving and sought to develop it.

Towards the 1700s at the latest, the nobility began to favour stuffed quilts as covers instead of ryas. At the same time, the great wars of the early 1700s and the Russian occupation led to the exile of the Swedish nobility from Finland. These factors, together with the economic depression caused by the years of famine and war, contributed to the cessation of rya production for a time. The so-called Gustavian period, which is considered to have begun in 1772 with the coup d’état of Gustav III, brought self-government and court life back to Finland. The internal construction and economic development that began at that time (known as the Age of Utility), together with increased trade with the rest of the world, helped western parts of Finland to prosper through shipbuilding and the tar trade. 

The improvement in living conditions naturally began to be reflected first in the rise in the standard of living of the gentry. New winds were blowing in the furnishing industry, and furniture fabrics and wall hangings were imported from Sweden to Finland. The rising living standards and the associated technical innovations in residential buildings, such as the introduction of smoke-controlling stoves and glass windows, contributed to the spread of rya and other interior textiles among the peasantry. As the art of weaving ryas spread from castles and royal estates to the surrounding population, vernacular ryas emerged among the peasantry, woven by skilled and talented weavers. Peasant weavers transferred ornaments from the cross stitches made by bourgeois women to the ryas they wove by visual memory. The designs and colours of the ryas, especially those made as bridal coverlets, were particularly rich. The oldest surviving ryas date from the 1700s, except for one dating from the 17th century. 

Folk-style rya and manor style rya – the heyday of folk rya 1770-1850

In the beginning, the sleeping platforms were wide, designed for more than one sleeper, and the shape of the rya resembled a large square rather than a rectangle. When the dwellings were cramped and the looms used for weaving were narrow, one or more central seams were needed for the wide ryas used as blankets. The weaving of the rya was not technically demanding, but as pattern drawings were not yet in use, the weaver had to have an eye for colour and compositional skills. They had to be able to memorize the alignment of the sides that were to be sewed together. Later, as prosperity brought the introduction of wide, two-weaver looms and beds began to be reduced to single beds, ryas became one-piece and rectangular instead of the square shape of the past.

Ryas were made for everyday use as well as for ostentation, using blue and red purchased dyes in addition to natural plant dyes as a sign of wealth. As the textile wore out, it was used for another, less important purpose, and finally used as a horse blanket, for example. Everyday coverlets were usually worn out in their own time.

The enrichment of the patterning of the weavings was influenced by a change in the weaving process: the ground weft and pile yarns were thinned, and the piles were cut to precise dimensions, so that the patterns began to stand out more clearly than in the case of long-piled coverlets. Decorative patterns were used on bridal ryas to wish the couple good luck, but also to express the wealth of the house and the profitability of the matrimony. Bridal and dowry ryas were made for the festive turning point in life, but also to be used as a coverlet from then on. 

Dowries were woven and sewn and included gifts that the bride made and gave to her new relatives. When a daughter of the house was married, she received a dowry of not only domestic animals but also a bridal rya and possibly a bridal chest. The dowry had to last for the rest of her life, as it was also her inheritance from her household. In most cases, valuable bridal ryas have been handed down to descendants. 

Originally a West Finnish tradition, the rya gradually spread deeper into the inland areas of Finland. At the same time, the motifs of the ryas changed; local differences and distinctive ways of decorating the ryas were born. In the areas furthest from the coastal harbours and urban settlements, the old-fashioned colouring and lustre wool yarns were preserved for the longest time.

Weavers of national rya

All ryas made before 1900 were textiles for use as coverlets. It is not known whether they were designed and made by professional weavers or rural weavers. In the era of castle ryas, the elaborate designs of professional weavers were usually for utility and bridal ryas in line with fashion trends. Since model drawings were not yet in use, the transfer of designs by memory only and their application to existing materials required good compositional skills and an eye for colour. In turn, the peasant weavers who worked under professional weavers in castle workshops and royal mansions memorised the designs, decorative motifs and colours used by the professionals and then applied them to their own purposes.

When using narrow looms, the weaver also had to use their memory to align the patterns so that the sewed halves of the finished rya somewhat matched. Peasant ryas are a testament to the skills of their makers, and at their best are considered to be Finnish folk art of their time.

The value of rya

Meanings associated with rya in the 1700-1800s

A rya has always been considered a textile of value. Its value has been determined by its size, material, weight and colours. As a large textile, it contains a lot of expensive material; when decorated, dyeing also added to the cost. In the Middle Ages, ryas are recorded in the account books and property lists of royal estates and were included in the distribution of inheritance in the estate inventory deeds. Textiles were a vital source of warmth at that time and that was reason enough for them to be valuable. Wool, the material used to make ryas, retains heat well and insulates moisture effectively.

Finnish craftsmanship and wool as a material were obviously highly valued at the Swedish court. Ryas were exported from Finland to Stockholm for use by the royal family and the court. However, the delivery of the ryas was mostly about a payment of taxes and not an actual fulfilment of order. The inhabitants of the Archipelago and coastal towns also paid their taxes in the form of ryas, for example by supplying their troops with boat ryas. 

The heyday of the traditional rya lasted until the 1850s, when social changes also brought changes in living conditions and the use of new materials to all sections of the population. The old type of utility items, such as the rya, was no longer needed. Industrialisation had a strong impact, and the succession of different styles highlighted the need for mass production. The nature of craftsmanship changed, and the traditional craftsmanship that had been part of Finnish folklore began to disappear. Hand-made and expensive ryas could not compete with cheaper industrially produced textiles. Eventually, even in peasant homes, the old textiles of value gave way to the new fashionable textiles.

The rise in the value of peasant ryas in the early 1900s

The change in the appreciation of the old ryas at the beginning of Finland’s independence made old peasant ryas into wall and interior textiles, so that displaying them and their decorative function became paramount in their appreciation. Lauri Kuoppamäki compared the importance of the rya to Finnish culture with the importance of folk music and poetry.

“Just as it has been considered necessary to collect old folk music and poetry, it is also important to take an inventory of the most precious flower of our folk art, the rya.” (Lastu ja Lanka 1933 no 4, 52; SKM-A0476.)

Kuoppamäki was not alone in his comparison. Arttu Brummer (1891–1951), then a leading figure in the Finnish art industry, also equated the old ryas, ‘the products of folk weaving,’ with folk songs, poems, and stories (Käsiteollisuus 1926, no 3, 43-44). “As proud as Greek culture may be of its beautiful vases, we can be equally proud of our wonderful ryas.” (Käsiteollisuus 1924, no 6, 99.)

In this way, Brummer incorporated the rya into the invaluable national cultural heritage. For him they were Finnish “treasures of art,” the fate of which he was particularly concerned about.  According to him, Finland should learn from the old European cultural countries, which had already imposed a special export duty to prevent the export of their own art treasures. According to Brummer, Finns should protect their old ryas and other ‘minor’ art treasures by an outright export ban. 

Where is this collection  that was assembled and stored about a hundred years ago? Today, the Craft Museum of Finland collections of folk art rya can be accessed from your home computer via the Finnish museums’ user service at skm.finna.fi. Soon they will also be available on the museums’ international user portal at https://www.europeana.eu/fi.

[Editor’s note: If you search with the word ryijy at skm.finna.fi , you will come up with over 200 images.]

Marjo Ahonen is Curator at the Craft Museum of Finland, and is a great fan of their collections of ryas. Marjo was part of the team of authors that wrote Ryijy elää! Finnish ryas 1778-2008. (2008) and her co-written article on ryas was also published in RYIJY!: The Finnish Ryijy-Rug (Helsinki: Designmuseo, 2009). Craft Museum of Finland works in cooperation with the Design Museum to preserve the Finnish rya tradition.

November 2022

See also an article on the This is Finland website, “Helsinki Show spotlights the Continual Renewal of an Age-Old Finnish Art Form.” It includes an informative short video.

Suopanen, Toumas. “A Short History of the Ryijy-Rug.” Suopanen wrote a beautifully-illustrated book, The Ryijy-Rug Lives On, Finnish Ryijy-Rugs 1778–2008.

“Finnish Ryijy Rugs at the Swedish Institute,” originally published in the Norwegian Textile Letter in July 2014.

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