Wihuri Foundation funding decisions in 2025
Total 460 new projects in research, art and civil society receive funding of 16.1 million euros. The supported initiatives explore, among other things, the invisible cultural heritage of the past, strengthen national preparedness, and build new forms of communities across Finland. This year’s funding emphasizes multidisciplinary collaboration and the important role of foundations as promoters of education, culture, and optimism about the future.
Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation is allocating a record 16.1 million euros this year to research (63%), art (18%), and societal activities (19%) in the form of grants, prizes, and other support.
Most of the funding—over 11 million euros—is distributed through the general grant application round. Through it, 460 new projects received support: grants were awarded to 344 individuals or working groups and 116 organisations.
In the general grant call organised in spring 2025, a record number of applications—more than 6,400—were submitted. The number of applications grew by 17 percent compared to the previous year, and the total amount of funding requested rose even more sharply, by about 23 percent.
“As a general-purpose foundation, we had of course anticipated an increase in applications, but the surge was even stronger than expected. Even though we increased our total distribution, only about seven percent of applicants received a positive grant decision, and many good, carefully prepared applications were left unfunded,” comments Arto Mäenmaa, Executive Director of Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation.
The number of applications rose particularly in the area of societal activities, where the Wihuri Foundation supports, for example, youth work, voluntary national defense, cultural activities, and the promotion of entrepreneurial skills.
“There is clearly a great need for flexible funding that builds an active and participatory civil society, especially amid cuts in public funding and the generally weak employment situation. Our grants naturally cannot fill the gap, but we can do our part to foster education, community spirit, and belief in future possibilities,” Mäenmaa notes.
One Million Euros to the future Architecture and Design Museum Helsinki
The largest individual grant of 2025, one million euros, goes to Architecture and Design Museum Helsinki, which is set to open in 2030. The donation, given in two installments in 2025 and 2026, will go to the The Foundation for the Finnish Museum of Architecture and Design’s endowment, the returns of which will enable ambitious operations in the museum’s new building.
“The Wihuri Foundation’s donation is a significant step on the road toward opening the new Museum of Architecture and Design. This early commitment to the project demonstrates faith in the future and recognition of the value that design, architecture, and cultural institutions bring to our society,” says Kaarina Gould, CEO of the Foundation for the Finnish Museum of Architecture and Design.
Highlights from projects in Societal Activities
This year, the Wihuri Foundation especially wishes to highlight innovative civic work that seeks new forms of cooperation and community.
4H Finland receives 75,000 euros to pilot a project that promotes seasonal thinking, food education, and local community spirit. Garden events organised across Finland will bring children, young people, and families together—even in small municipalities with few leisure activities for youth.
Irti Huumeista ry also receives 75,000 euros. The organisation provides support services for people using drugs, those in recovery, and their loved ones. Every drug-related death affects a large circle of people, and with Wihuri Foundation support, the organisation will especially develop bereavement support for families and friends of those lost to drugs.
Baltic Sea Action Group is awarded 75,000 euros for a science communication project that aims to increase public understanding of the role of soil as a carbon sink and as a source of biodiversity.
Finnish Swimming Teaching and Lifesaving Federation receives 30,000 euros to promote water safety among immigrant families through multilingual communication.
Teknologiasta kiinnostuneiden opiskelijoiden asunto- ja virkistysyhdistys ry is granted 100,000 euros to develop a new kind of technology entrepreneurship accelerator program. The program aims to attract the world’s most passionate young talents in technology to Finland and to inspire engineering students toward growth entrepreneurship.
Funding for doctoral research and multidisciplinary projects
In the field of science, the Wihuri Foundation most frequently supports early-career researchers. This year, the foundation awarded 219 grants for scientific projects, of which 169 fund doctoral research.
The foundation especially aims to support uninterrupted full-time work in scientific fields. Through the general grant call, a total of 156 grants were awarded for one year of full-time scientific or artistic work.
The Wihuri Foundation also provides so-called homing funding, intended to help researchers returning to Finland from abroad to establish their own research groups. This year, recipients include Katarzyna Wisniewska, returning from Croatia for research on artificial intelligence applications, and Kaniz Moriam, a materials science researcher returning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States.
Especially in large-scale research projects, the Wihuri Foundation encourages systemic thinking and multidisciplinarity. This year, the foundation supports the establishment of a new professorship in security of supply at the Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry and the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University of Helsinki with 100,000 euros. Food and pharmaceutical security are vital issues for Finland, requiring even closer cooperation among the pharmaceutical, food, and agricultural sectors.
Researcher Kaisa Autere and her team at the University of Helsinki receive 50,000 euros for the ARK-DATA project, which combines archaeology, microarchaeology, computer science, and digital humanities to improve the digital accessibility of archaeological research materials. The project focuses particularly on invisible cultural heritage—organic materials that have almost completely decomposed in the soil but can be studied using new microarchaeological methods.
New partner museums in Hämeenlinna and Kuopio
Kuopio Art museum Photo:Vicente Serra/Kuopion kaupunki
Staff of the Hämeenlinna Art Museum in 2025. Photo: Petra Hollmérus / Hämeenlinna Art Museum
The Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation supports artistic work in music, literature, dance, and theatre, and funds, for example, instrument purchases, performances and events, and the piloting of various cultural projects.
The foundation’s visual arts activities include expanding the contemporary art collection donated to the Rovaniemen taidemuseo and funding artist residencies and the kummimuseo (partner museum) program in visual arts.
The purpose of the kummimuseo program is to offer small and medium-sized modern art museums opportunities for new experiments outside of limited budgetary frameworks. So far, partner museum projects have been realized in Rauma, Joensuu, Lappeenranta, Tornio, Kerava, Kouvola, and Imatra.
The newly selected partner museums are Hämeenlinna Art Museum and Kuopio Art Museum, each receiving 100,000 euros for their own contemporary art projects. Hämeenlinna Art Museum will celebrate its 75th anniversary in 2027 with an exhibition in which artist collectives explore what is needed to ensure a better future. In Kuopio, the partner museum funding will launch a media art festival aimed particularly at young audiences, spreading from the museum to, for example, cinemas and online platforms.
