Tuuli and Matti, the Kotaja couple from Finnish Plant
Tuuli and Matti Kotaja run a small family farm in Vampula, Finland. The fields have been cultivated by Matti's family since his grandfather built the house near the family river in 1917, the year of Finland's independence. Since then, the family has always grown wheat, barley, and peas, but Tuuli's arrival brought a breath of fresh air. In fact, his first name in Finnish means "wind"...
When Matti was a young man, he dreamed of a career as a professional musician. In the 1980s, he developed Finnish Percussion (FP) congas, which achieved considerable international success. Unfortunately, his conquest of the world with the congas faltered with the fall of the dollar, but the idea of creating something exceptional remained.
With Tuuli, Matti found a partner who shared his passion for roses. They married in 1994, and the letters FP (Finnish Percussion, the congas) became Finnish Plant when the couple began to develop the idea of cultivating roses professionally. Their initial idea was to make rose oil, but Tuuli's culinary creativity and Matti's passion for trying new things led the couple to create a test batch of rose petal jam. The path to a marketable product had just begun: after countless tests and years of development, they were finally ready to start producing roses professionally in 2012.
La Rosa Kotaja is Tuuli and Matti's legacy for lovers of culinary well-being
For years, the Kotaja family has been developing the Rosa Rugosa Hybrid Arctic variety to adapt it to the harsh northern growing conditions as well as to meet specific taste requirements. In the future, the Rosa Kotaja variety, created as a result of this breeding work, will completely replace the Rosa Rugosa Hybrid. It is important in the breeding process to utilize Arctic growing conditions and to consider environmental factors. Irrigation water from the family river, the amount of sunlight...
Midnight sun 24 hours a day, and organic farming create the basis for the development of a healthy and tasty rose-based product.
