LAAVU is a multi-disciplinary architecture and urban design practice.

APPROACH

We don’t wait for change to happen. Laavu works with a nimble, responsive design approach—addressing complex conditions with meaningful architecture, thoughtful interiors, and culturally grounded concepts. We engage physical and regulatory constraints as opportunities, developing intuitive solutions that balance function, craft, and aesthetic clarity.

Laavu’s foundation grew from the localized resourcefulness and community-driven energy of Detroit, where an ethos of inclusive, equitable, and responsive design took shape. Today, working between Brooklyn and Detroit, we continue to build on those values—bringing a sensitivity to context, material, and human experience while drawing from broader global influences.

Our practice moves fluidly across scales, from interiors and objects to buildings and urban environments, always attentive to how people inhabit and experience space. Through collaboration with clients, makers, developers, and community partners, we develop design principles that are both robust and adaptable. We believe meaningful spaces emerge through collaboration—between people, disciplines, and ideas—and our role is to shape environments that are thoughtful, purposeful, and well crafted.

WHO WE ARE:

KAIJA WUOLLET

KAIJA WUOLLET Founder, Principal

Kaija founded Laavu in 2010 with a vision rooted in city-building—driven by creative, multidisciplinary collaboration and a commitment to design quality. Her city-forward approach, with an emphasis on careful craftsmanship and thoughtful design, strives to improve everyday life. At Laavu, Kaija draws out her team’s unique abilities through effective communication and a rigorous design process. She has extensive experience leading diverse teams and coordinating complex consultant networks across projects of varying scale.

Drawing from her Finnish heritage and deep connection to nature and craft, Kaija brings a humanist lens to the design of objects, spaces, and cities. As the founder of Laavu, she led a decade of acclaimed work including The Commons, the Pink Zoning/Mix Tape initiative with the City of Detroit, and the MACC Development master plan, alongside a broad portfolio of adaptive reuse and neighborhood-scale projects.

Kaija brings design leadership that spans architecture, interiors, urban design, and planning. In 2023, she joined Reddymade as Principal, where she expanded her impact on the built environment with a continued focus on equity, resilience, and cultural relevance. During her tenure, she helped bring in work at Michigan Central—a subsidiary of Ford Motor Company revitalizing the historic train station in the neighborhood where Laavu was founded. Prior to Reddymade, Kaija served as Director of City Building at WXY architecture and urban design, where she led initiatives for clients including Amtrak, Empire State Development, the City of Dallas, New York Power Authority, NYC Health + Hospitals, and the Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice.

Kaija remains closely connected to Detroit’s entrepreneurial energy—as co-founder and Board Member of Ponyride, through her service on the Board of the Corktown Business Association, and via ongoing collaborations with developers, artists, and community organizers. These relationships have helped realize Laavu’s city-building mission across a wide range of scales—from furniture to buildings to entire neighborhoods.

NOAH RESNICK Principal

Noah joined Laavu in 2016.

Noah’s 15+ years of research in the area of urban theory and history -initially as a graduate student at MIT, and now as the director of the graduate architecture program at the University of Detroit Mercy - parallels the central themes at the root of these Detroit based projects, and directly informs his professional design practice.

This research currently focuses on development along disinvested commercial and transit corridors and the role of establishing a positive urban identity to secure a successful public realm. On the architectural scale, Noah has extensive experience on the job site, leading construction administration for projects in New York City and Detroit.

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We provide full-service pre-development, architecture, interior architecture services.

PRE-DEVELOPMENT: we assist developers/building owners in creating strategic framework plans to develop sustainable, city-building projects.

ARCHITECTURE : we guide owners through the design process, providing thoughtful, quality designs, making effective, memorable and unique places for people.

INTERIOR ARCHITECTURE : we design interior spaces, elements, flow and objects, envisioning the end-user experience

TEAM : 2011- present

WHAT IS A LAAVU?

Laavu is a traditional, ethnic lean-to shelter intended for temporary residence during hiking trips in the wilderness. In Finland they are found throughout Lapland, near national parks and fishing spots, and are free to use by visitors. In our design work, we find deep inspiration in the natural environment. As in the Finnish tradition, wilderness can provide the most intimate and enriching human experience.

Photos by EE BERGER