Raili Inkeri Marjatta Paatelainen (Helsinki, Finland, August 15, 1926 - Helsinki, May 16, 2021) and Frans Reima Ilmari Pietilä (Turku, Finland, August 25, 1923 - Helsinki, August 26, 1993) were a Finnish architect couple whose work has been recognized as a hybrid between organic architecture and modernity. Their innovative approach to architectural projects positioned them as key figures in 20th-century Finnish and European architecture.
Frans Reima Ilmari Pietilä graduated from the Helsinki University of Technology in 1953 and served as a professor of architecture at the University of Oulu from 1973 to 1979. His design for the Tampere Library, better known as the Metso Library (1955-1967), earned him rapid recognition due to his exploration of forms inspired by nature and Finnish culture.
Reima Pietilä was interested in the influence of the "phenomenology of space" in architecture, as reflected in the Dipoli Student Center (1961-66) for the Helsinki University of Technology, where two other important works by renowned Finnish architects can also be found: the Lutheran Chapel designed by Heikki and Kaija Siren, along with the main building and the sports pavilion by Elissa and Alvar Aalto.
Raili Inkeri Marjatta Paatelainen, also a graduate of the Helsinki University of Technology in 1956, worked with Alvar Aalto between 1956 and 1957, before starting to collaborate with Pietilä in the early 1960s. They married in 1963, and soon after, the studio was renamed Raili and Reima Pietilä Architects, consolidating significant projects of national and international relevance. Their collaboration was reflected in the Finnish Embassy in New Delhi (1963-1980), where they reinterpreted both Indian and Finnish vernacular traditions through architecture attuned to the climate and site.
One of their most iconic projects was the official residence of the President of Finland, Mäntyniemi (1983-1993), which synthesizes their exploration of the relationship between the building and the landscape, using materials and forms that evoke Finnish nature.
Throughout their careers, the Pietiläs projected architecture that dialogued with the place and cultural identity, combining formal abstraction with poetic references, which they translated into all of their works, including those in Kuwait and Delhi. Their only daughter, Annukka Pietilä (born 1963), is also a well-known architect.
