Oiva Unikko Tableware: Sami Ruotsalainen's Plates and Mug

Oiva is the everyday tableware shape Sami Ruotsalainen designed for Marimekko, and Unikko is the poppy Maija Isola drew in 1964. This piece looks at what happens when the two meet on a plate, a deep plate and a mug: what each piece is for, how the sizes relate, and how to mix colourways on one table without it turning into noise.

A quiet shape for a loud print

Oiva was drawn as a working shape rather than a display piece. The plates are flat and open, with a low rim and plenty of usable surface, and the mug is a straight, steady cylinder. Nothing in the profile competes for attention, which is exactly why the range has been able to carry so many Marimekko prints over the years. The shape does the job; the print supplies the character.

That division of labour matters with Unikko more than with almost any other pattern. The poppy is large, round and graphic, and on a fussy, scalloped or heavily moulded plate it would fight the form. On Oiva it simply sits on the surface, cropped by the edge of the plate the way it is cropped at the selvedge of a length of fabric. Each piece shows a slightly different section of the flower, so no two plates on the table read quite the same.

Every piece in this group is made in Thailand from white stoneware. The white matters: it is the background colour of the print itself, so the unprinted areas of the plate and the paler parts of the pattern run together, and the poppies appear to float rather than sit on a coloured glaze.

Unikko: the poppy that broke a rule

Unikko is now so closely tied to Marimekko that it is easy to forget it began as an act of contrariness. In the early 1960s the house was known for abstract prints, and founder Armi Ratia is widely reported to have said that Marimekko would not print flowers. Maija Isola answered in 1964 with a whole range of floral designs, Unikko among them. The poppy went into production, outlived the rule and became the print most people picture when they hear the name Marimekko.

Isola designed Unikko for fabric, and its scale was set by the width of a printed textile, not a dinner plate. That is worth remembering when you look at the tableware. The flowers are not shrunk into a tidy repeat; they are allowed to run off the edge. Today Marimekko describes the poppy as a symbol of creativity, and on a plate it reads less as decoration and more as a confident block of colour. For the full story of how the print moved from cloth to ceramics, see our piece on Unikko, from fabric to tableware.

The pieces, one by one

Plate 20 cm

The Oiva / Unikko Plate 20 cm is the most flexible piece in the group. At 20 cm across and 0.41 kg it works as a side plate at dinner, a breakfast plate for toast and fruit, and a dessert plate. It is light enough to stack a pile on an open shelf without strain, and it is the size most households end up using several times a day.

Plate 25 cm

The Oiva / Unikko Plate 25 cm is the dinner plate. At 25 cm and 0.79 kg it is nearly twice the weight of the smaller plate, and you feel that weight as stability on the table. This is the base of a laid place setting: it takes a full main course and gives the print the most room, so the poppies are at their largest and least cropped here.

Deep Plate 20.5 cm

The Oiva / Unikko Deep Plate 20.5 cm measures 20.5 cm across and weighs 0.6 kg. It is the piece for soup, pasta, risotto, salads and anything with sauce. Because it is almost the same diameter as the small flat plate, the two stack neatly in a cupboard, and the deep plate stacks on the 25 cm plate when you lay the table in two layers.

Mug 2.5 dl

The Oiva / Unikko Mug 2.5 dl holds 2.5 dl, stands 9.5 cm high and is 8 cm across, at 0.28 kg. It is a generous everyday size for tea or a milky coffee rather than an espresso cup. The straight wall carries the print all the way round, so the poppy is visible from whichever side you set it down.

Sizes and uses at a glance

All four are white stoneware and dishwasher, oven, microwave and freezer safe. One practical note from Marimekko: remove the sticker from the base of each piece before first use, as it contains a small amount of metal, which matters if the piece is going into a microwave.

Mixing colourways on one table

Unikko on Oiva comes in many colourways, from the classic White / Red / Blue to softer combinations such as White / Clay / Rose and White / Light Blue / Pale Rose, deeper ones such as White / Plum / Cranberry / Pink and White / Beige / Light Sand / Dark Green, and the stark White / Black. Not every piece comes in every colourway, so it is worth checking the options on each product before planning a set.

Mixing works best with a simple structure. A few approaches that hold together well:

• One print, two or three colourways. Because the poppy shape is constant, changing the colour reads as variation rather than clutter. Keep to two or three colourways for a table of four to six.
• Anchor with the dinner plate. Set every place on the same colourway of the 25 cm plate, then vary the small plates, deep plates and mugs on top. The table stays orderly from a distance and lively close up.
• Stay within one temperature. White / Clay / Rose, White / Light Blue / Pale Rose and White / Plum / Cranberry / Pink sit together as a soft, warm group. White / Red / Blue and White / Black make a sharper, more graphic pair.
• Use the plain white pieces as rests. A plain White plate between two printed ones gives the eye somewhere to pause, which matters most on a long table.
• Give everyone their own mug. Mugs are the easiest place to let colourways multiply. A cupboard of mixed Unikko mugs means each person can claim one.

If you prefer a quieter table, keep to one colourway throughout. Unikko is bold enough that a single colour repeated across plates, deep plates and mugs already gives a strong, coherent look.

Building a set that lasts

Because Oiva is a core Marimekko shape and Unikko its best known print, there is no need to buy everything at once. A sensible starting point for two is a pair each of the 25 cm plate, the deep plate and the mug, with the 20 cm plate added for breakfast. From there you can add colourways season by season, knowing the shape will match.

Stoneware this robust is meant to be used daily: it goes from freezer to oven to dishwasher, so leftovers can be stored, reheated and served on the same plate. The print is the reason most people choose Unikko, but the shape is the reason they keep using it. To see these pieces alongside other dinner plates, deep plates and bowls, browse the Plates & Bowls collection.