Name: Marika Varpenius
Company: Outdoor magazine Luode
Title: Founder, editor in chief
Country: Finland
Favorite outdoor activities:
Hiking, skiing, winter fishing with nets. I also have 10 siberian huskies.
What’s your main contribution of being in the Jury do you think?
I used to test outdoor gear as a profession and worked as an outdoor journalist for 7 years. Then I moved to Kilpisjärvi in Finnish Lapland, a small village of 150 people, and wanted to do something else. My life was earlier all about hiking (weeks in Lapland) and when I moved here, it changed. Now it is just everyday life outdoors, above treeline in wind and snow. I can open my front door and walk the fells. I used to call that hiking. Now it is everyday life, outdoor gear is everyday gear. At the same time I still wanted to write and offer Finnish outdoor people something special. So I founded a new magazine in Finland, Luode.