Helsinki seems to rise organically from the restrained and even austere nature that surrounds it. Across these waterways, forests, and rocky landscapes, thousands of former subjects of the Russian Empire fled to the city after 1917, escaping the revolution, civil war, and Bolshevik repressions—both aristocrats and ordinary people alike. Many chose Helsinki because of its proximity to Saint Petersburg, but émigrés also arrived from Ukraine, the Baltic states, and the... see more