Top hundred best selling at Pitkämies this year

1. Nissinen, Jyrki: Kaikki vierailuni Italialaisessa kodissa
2. Nissinen, Jyrki: Borgtron 08
3. Sailamaa, Anna: Ollaan nätisti
4. Laitinen, Karri: Kafkan Tutti
5. Hanks, Fletcher: I shall destroy all civilised planets
6. Tiitu: Jää
7. Nissinen, Jyrki: Yli 10 000 Koiran Koiranäyttely
8. Rapi, Aapo: Meti
9. Burns, Charles: Black Hole
10. Miller, Frank: Yön ritari
11. Rapi, Aapo: Kuningas Toffee
12. Schrauwen, Olivier: Poika Kulta
13. Brown, Jeffrey: Haparointia
14. Nissinen, Jyrki: Borgtron 9
15. Vähämäki, Amanda: Äitienpäivä
16. Delisle, Guy: Shenzhen
17. Ranta, Ville: Kajaani
18. Satrapi, Marjane: Embroideries
19. Delisle, Guy: Merkintöjä Burmasta
20. Jodorowsky & Moebius: Incal
21. Nissinen, Jyrki: Nuolee kuin eläin sipsiä
22. Tukiainen, Katja: Rusina
23. Turunen, Marko: Ufoja Lahdessa
24. Ware, Chris: Acme Novelty Library 18
25. Ware, Chris: Jimmy Corrigan, the smartest kid on earth
26. Bergman, Benjamin: Troll on
27. Latva-Nikkola, Jarno: Tunteiden Maisteri
28. Mordan, Rutu: Exit wounds
29. Bagge, Pete: Buddy does Seattle
30. Canales, Diaz: Blacksad 2
31. Carré. Lilli: Korpi-Peten kootut
32. Harkham, Sammy: Crickets 2
33. Magnolia, Mike: Hellboy, pimeyden kutsu
34. Nissinen, Jyrki: Borgtron 03
35. Nissinen, Jyrki: Kiimaiset maantiesuolan imeskelijät
36. Lutes, Jason: Berlin book two, city of smoke
37. Rapia, Kati: Miracle Baby
38. Clowes, Daniel: Ghostworld
39. Florent Ruppert/ Jérôme Mulot: Apinatarha
40. Jason: I killed Adolf Hitler
41. Prince, Liz: Will you still love me if i wet the bed?
42. Thompson, Craig: Blankets
43. Tomine, Adrian: Shortcomings
44. Brinkman, Matt: Teratoid Heights
45. Brown, Jeffrey: Be a man
46. Delisle, Guy: Pyong Yang, a journey through North Korea. Paperback
47. Harkham, Sammy: Crickets 1
48. Jansson, Tove: Moomin, the complete Tove Jansson strip, volume 1
49. King Nosmo: Kulttuurilehti Esteban
50. Moore, Alan: The Watchmen
51. Nilsen, Anders: Dogs and water
52. Bagge, Pete: Hate annual 07
53. Brown, Jeffrey: Every girl is the end of the world to me
54. Canales, Diaz: Blacksad 1
55. Carré. Lilli: Dorado Park
56. Clowes, Daniel: Caricature
57. Gauld, Tom: Three Very Small Comics volume II
58. Gauld, Tom: Three Very Small Comics volume III
59. Koljonen, Hanna: Nirvana
60. Martin, Jacques: Alix: Spartacuksen poika
61. Moore, Alan: From Hell
62. Rope, Jenni: Wednesday
63. Satrapi, Marjane: Persepolis boxed set
64. Thompson, Craig: Carnet de voyage
65. Vähämäki, Amanda: Souvlaki Circus
66. Bagge, Pete: Buddy does Jersey
67. Bagge, Pete: Hate annual 06
68. Barry, Lynda: What it is
69. Brown, Jeffrey: I am going to be small
70. Brown, Jeffrey: Unlikely
71. Clowes, Daniel: David Boring
72. Cotter, Joshua: Skyscrapers of the midwest
73. Gauld, Tom: Robots, Monsters etc
74. Hayashi, Seiichi: Red Colored Elegy
75. Miller, Frank: Sin City
76. Oliba, Tsugumi & Obata, Takeshi: Death Note 01
77. Rapi, Aapo: Kelomökien mies
78. Schrauwen, Olivier: My Boy
79. Turunen, Marko: Lihat puntarissa
80. Yokoyama, Yuichi: New Engineering
81. B., David: Epileptic
82. Bagge, Pete: Hate annual 04
83. Bagge, Pete: Hate annual 1
84. Bechdel, Allison: Fun Home
85. Brown, Chester: I never liked you
86. Brown, Jeffrey: Any easy intimacy (AEIOU)
87. Burns, Charles: Big Baby
88. Clowes, Daniel: Ice Haven
89. Cole, Allison: Never Ending Summer
90. Gauld, Tom: Hunter and Painter
91. Glömp: Glömp 9
92. Hanawa, Kazuichi: Doing Time
93. Jacobs, Edgar: Blake and Mortimer: Mystery of the great pyramid 1
94. Lutes, Jason: Berliini
95. Nilsen, Anders: Monologues for the coming plague
96. Nilsen, Anders: Sisyfos
97. Nissinen, Jyrki: Yli 10000 koiran koiranättely
98. Rall, Ted: To Afghanistan and back
99. Ranta, Ville: Isi on vähän väsynyt
100. Ranta, Ville: Sade
101. Tatsumi, Yoshihiro: Goodbye
102. Tatsumi, Yoshihiro: The Pushman and other stories
103. Tikkanen, Petteri: Kanerva ja yks juttu
104. Tolppanen, Petri & Kaakinen, Jussi: Sarasvatin hiekaa
105. Turunen, Marko: Supernormal
106. V/A: Japan


as a first immediate comment: that's a lot of Jyrki Nissinen!

Kultainen Penaali

Pitkämies and Sarjakuvakeskus were awarded with the "Kultainen Penaali" (Golden Pencilholder) for "Vuoden Kulttuuriteko" (Cultural Act of the Year) by the University paper. We beat Kiasma and Ruisrock to it. Ha!

" Kolmannelle linjalle Kallioon syntyi keväällä sarjakuvan ystävän keidas. Suomen sarjakuvaseuran, Kutikuti-kollektiivin ja Pitkämies-kaupan perustamassa Sarjakuvakeskuksessa voi levähtää arjen aherruksesta, selailla albumeita ja katsastaa gallerian näyttelyn.
Kirpputorit, työpajat ja keikat tekevät keskuksen toiminnasta niin pienimuotoisen söpöä, että sydän läkähtyy."


You can read the rest of the awards and award winners (in finnish) here

A seven month delay

i really loved how pristine and empty the store looks in this picture

In case you are wondering, this article was written about two weeks after the store opened but published only last week

Huuda Huuda in the spotlight

Joensuun Yliopilaslehti does a report on Huuda Huuda.

nice media attention for Pitkämies

That's the fontpage and a spread inside the free Metropaper friday 22.10. If you want to read the article, here you go. I could have just linked to the article but i just wanted to show that Ruffeo Hearts Lil Snotty denim jacket i am wearing.

Kuti Kuti party at Pitkämies

The new Kuti tabloid decorated as on a christmas tree!




People start arriving in the store....





The new Kuti is devoured by the attentive reading audience




More people in the store...





And even more, the place is packed and the party is in full swing!






The snack offerings, the usual crisps and nuts. Those two plates with the brown stuff, that's homemade toffee (fudge). Was removed from the fridge in the store two days later. Nobody had touched it.




The band starts playing. That's Benjamin Bergman on the left and Aapo Rapi on your right. The guy in the middle is amazingly squatting and playing guitar at the same time.




The last song of the band. After that i kicked everybody out so that they could pursue the party at Liberte bar and i could go home.

A short history of the Pitkämies store

A short history

In the summer of 2004 the Pitkämies mailorder was born; the new Eightball had come out and i wanted to buy in it Helsinki, which has three comic stores. None of them carried the comic in question which bummed me out. On the other hand, with the idea of running my own store already in the back of my head, I was thrilled or could not believe nobody else had thought of carrying quality foreign graphic novels and comics in a store. However, since i had no money or experience or knowledge of the finnish market (having moved here only a year earlier), this own store seemed like a very remote idea. It was my wife Hanna, who gave the excellent tip i should start by running a mailorder.

I had 100 € extra laying around that i invested in ordering a small batch of comics (including ofcourse, Eightball #23). I had hoped they would arrive in time for the comic festival, which would be then the official of my store or better yet, mailorder. Ofcourse they didn't. I had a reserved a table for the comics festival in Helsinki so i had no other option but to display my own personal collection, and saying to people that these were the kind of books and comics i would soon be selling through my website. The scheme worked, i handed out handwritten cards with my site's name on it, I collected some email address and by the time the comics arrived at my place, the most incredible thing happened: people actually started ordering them.

With the money i made selling those comics, I ordered more and that's how it slowly but gradually evolved into what it is today. In principal i only order books that i like myself. Sometimes that's a bit difficult to guess but in general you could say i avoid superhero stuff, lame European masters of the nineth art (Bilal,...) or teenage manga. I am however willing to try out new stuff and i regularly just buy straight from the artists if he or she happen to have some mini-comics that seem interesting.

After about three years of selling comics at conventions and through a modest site, the stock of books slowly grew until my tiny storage space in the cellar of my appartment was filled with boxes of comic books and became inaccesible for even a very slim guy like me. In april 2007 i decided i would seriously start looking for a decent spot for a store in Helsinki. To my personal great surprise locating a good and available storefront proved extremely difficult. Furthermore, i initially wanted to incorporate the comic store into a vegan coffee place (an idea which is actually still likely to be executed, albeit not within this decade) so i needed a place that was big enough, had decent aircirculation, the appropriate sanatory facilities and, above all, was affordable. Ha ha ha. Looking back now, i can't believe i was so naieve to think i could actually find a match for those criteria.

Along the way I asked the dudes from Ifsociety to join forces with me. The present location of the Pitkämies store was found and checked out thoroughly in december 2007, when i made the first offer on the place. Which was denied. The landlord mistakenly thought that Ifsociety was called High society and since the area of Kallio in Helsinki is vaguely resemblant to a "bohemian" area with lots of cheap bars, he was extremely suspicious. But, the misunderstanding was resolved and in early march the offer was approved.

At that point I asked the Finnish Comics Society if they were interested in subrenting the second storefront in the space plus the back room. I knew they had plans of moving out of their current offices (but that's a whole different can of worms) so my offer did not fall upon deaf ears. The Finnish Comics Society wanted to open a comics art gallery in the second storefront and use the backroom as an office space. Things started to come together nicely and when it turned out that the whole cellar (130 plus square meter) was available as well i "forced" the Kuti Kuti collective to come and join forces with us. Et voila, a nice synergy was born, a complex that combines a commercial yet culturally friendly store, an official non profit comics organisation and to top it all off, a collective of twelve stubborn comic artists all under one roof.

Pitkämies officially opened on the 17th of May.