When Laura Kirsilä followed her spouse from Turku to Tampere three years ago, she knew next to nothing about her new hometown.

Kirsilä, who sells photography, content creation and brand development services for a living, was looking for a long-term home where she could live and work. She found exactly what she was looking for among the enormous paned windows and staggeringly high rooms of a loft-style Lumo home in Emil Aaltonen’s old shoe factory.

Over the course of the past three years, the couple have set up the 62.5 m² apartment to their tastes, and Kirsilä has gradually familiarised herself with her new hometown. From the centre of Tammela, one can easily walk to the market for shopping, to the Kauppi woodlands for exercise and to the shore of Näsijärvi.

Let’s have a look at some of Kirsilä’s favourite spots at home and around the neighbourhood:

“I went to see the apartment while it was being renovated. All I had to see were the windows and the room height, and I thought to myself, this is going to be great. I dreamed of an apartment that could fit a large dining table. Now we have a table framed by windows. In the morning it is bathed in sunlight, and we spend a lot of time there,” Kirsilä says.

"I found a mismatched pair of old Viennese chairs from the Tori online secondhand marketplace. We like to mix and match old and new, recycled and self-made elements. The lamp hanging above the dining table is made from a branch found in a friend’s yard; the shelves are birch planks we got from my father-in-law’s farm,” Kirsilä says.

“I love to cook, and while the kitchens in apartment buildings often are little more than closets, our own kitchen is large and spacious. There is enough space here for work and leisure. My spouse and I both work from home a lot, so our kitchen gets a lot of use.”

“My signature dishes vary, but lately I have made tacos, guacamole and salsa. They are a real everyday treat. I am also fond of the kitchen corner, as it offers a view of the entire apartment.”

“Our one-bedroom apartment is officially classified as a studio apartment, as our bedroom, which is partitioned off with a sliding door, does not have a window. This is actually my favourite thing about it. The rest of the apartment is brightly lit, but the bedroom is totally dark. It is a nest-like nook. We don’t have a TV, so we watch a lot of Netflix on our computers. The room height is almost four metres, which leaves plenty of room for an extravagant ceiling light fixture.”

“Our home is so close to the city centre that it is a short distance to everywhere. The Tammelantori marketplace is right next door. We will often go and hang out at the food, vegetable and flower stalls. You can find a café, salmon soup and black sausage.”

“In the summer, I like to buy peas, strawberries and raspberries. There is a great Mexican food stall at the edge of the marketplace. Their tacos are wonderful,” Kirsilä says.

“Our home is in Emil Aaltonen's old shoe factory, and right next door, across from the marketplace, is Emil Aaltonen Park. It’s a good place to hang out and a summer living room that serves as an extension of our home. Sometimes we will go and sit on a bench by the fountain, or have a picnic on the grass, play card games or enjoy a glass of wine.”

“It’s only a twenty-minute walk from our home to the Rauhaniemi folk spa by the shore of Näsijärvi. There’s a beach and a sauna at Rauhaniemi, and they add the water temperature on a chalkboard by the sauna building,” Kirsilä says.

“My spouse and I like to go swimming once or twice a week in the winter and autumn. Sometimes we will go on an evening swim in the summer, but often the headland is so full that we end up on the Rosendahl beach in Pyynikki. You can play volleyball there.”