Culture for babies and children – Culture kids in Helsinki and Vantaa

Photo: Daniel Leiviskä

The Culture Kids in Helsinki

The Culture Kids activities already involve 16 500 children living in Helsinki and approximately thirty godparent actors. Children living in Helsinki and born in 2020 or after will receive an annual invitation to at least two events arranged by the culture godparents. The procedure will continue until the child begins school attendance. Babies born this year will have, as their godparents, the city library as well as Sports Services that will introduce the smallest member of the family to the world of literary art and physical exercise. 

“The library offers its godchildren and their families wide and varied art and cultural events that will bolster the interaction between a child and an adult. We, naturally, want to support a child’s reading already from the moment the child is born, and we encourage families to have joint reading sessions,” says Minna Rimpilä, special librarian at the City Library.

“Last spring, we began our cultural activities with an inclusive event consisting of elements taken from the theater, which plays with interaction and encounters with the help of various animal characters. The motivators of the bilingual session are first books, targeted at the smallest members of the family: Pikku tirriäinen by Mira Mallius and the Säg hej books by Annika Sandelin. In the course of the spring, you could participate in these culture kid events at Itäkeskus, Malmi, and Kannelmäki libraries, as well as at the Helsinki Central Library Oodi. In the autumn of 2024, the provision of events will expand, and, in addition to Oodi, the Töölö, Pasila, Oulunkylä, Viikki, and Herttoniemi libraries will also participate,” Rimpilä continues.

Children living in Helsinki and born in 2020 or after can enroll in the Culture Kids activities online at the Culture Kids website

The Culture Kids service is administered by the City of Helsinki Culture and Leisure Division and supported by the Jane and Aatos Erkko Foundation.

Vantaa Culture Kids

The Vantaa Culture Kids project offers Vantaa families with children high-quality and age-appropriate cultural events. Every child born in 2023 and after, and living in Vantaa, gets free-of-charge cultural visits until they reach school age. The events are provided by Vantaa  Culture Partners whose number amounts to more than twenty. Vantaa City Library has participated in the project from the very beginning.  

Vantaa Culture Kids and their families can choose their cultural visits from a vast number of events produced by various culture partners. Thus, culture kids get to familiarize themselves with various art forms and cultural institutions. The library strives to bring culture kid events to as many libraries in Vantaa as possible, so that families can, at the same time, take a peek at their own local library. The main goal of the library events is to support families to read. 

The library’s 2024 culture kids event is based on the Yhtenä yönä first book written by Kaisa Happonen and illustrated by Satu Kettunen. The thought-provoking text and the fantastic illustration tell about a poem-length night when nobody sleeps.  “Listening and watching the book has been turned into an especially experiential event by combining it with music, specifically composed for it, and age-appropriate activities. Some of the events are carried out in cooperation with Vantaa Orchestra’s string quartet,” says Elina Simes, special librarian who planned, composed, and arranged the event.   

You can register your child as a Vantaa Culture Kid online at Vantaa Culture Kids website