A Finnish Himmeli Turns Straw Into Moving Geometry

A stalk of rye looks like an unlikely building material. But cut its hollow stem into short tubes, run thread through them, and you can make a shape that holds together in the air. Link several of those shapes and you have a Finnish himmeli, a traditional hanging mobile. Part of its charm is that it never quite looks the same twice. As it turns, lines that seemed to cross a moment ago separate again.

The Thread Runs Through The Straw:

Dried rye straw gives the mobile its golden color, but it also does a practical job. Each hollow piece carries the thread that connects one joint to the next. From across the room, you see the straw edges and the open space between them. Most of the thread stays out of sight.

Finnish maker Eija Koski dries her rye, cuts the stems at their natural joints, and sorts the pieces by thickness. That work happens before she starts threading. Sorting lets her choose tubes that look balanced together. A thin stem that might disappear in a large frame can be just right for a smaller shape.

Two Pyramids Make One Building Block:

A common shape in a himmeli is an octahedron. Picture two square pyramids joined at their bases. Four edges form the square in the middle. Four more rise to the top point, and another four descend to the bottom point. That makes 12 straw pieces for one frame, with no solid faces to block the view.

A maker can repeat that frame in different sizes. A large shape might sit at the center, with smaller ones hanging from its corners. Koski pays attention to how the shapes balance around the point where the mobile hangs. On a table, the pieces might look well matched. Once suspended, it’s easier to see whether the whole thing hangs evenly.

The Dining Table Was A Place Of Honor:

In Finland, families traditionally hung himmelis above the dining table as part of Christmas celebrations. The custom also looked ahead to the next harvest. Some households left the mobile up until midsummer, so it could remain part of the room long after the holiday ended. Related straw mobiles are found elsewhere in the Nordic region, too.

Makers still work with rye, but some use hollow paper, metal, or plastic tubes. Those choices change the look of the finished piece, and makers don’t all draw the line in the same place between a traditional himmeli and a design inspired by one. For Koski, straw, symmetry, and the freedom to move are central to the craft.

Watch The Straw And Its Shadow:

If you see a himmeli by a window, look at the wall as well as the mobile. Find the square around the middle of one frame, then watch its shadow as the straw turns. The square can narrow almost to a line without any of the pieces changing shape. A still photo can show you how the mobile is built. A little movement shows you what it was built to do.