NEW YORK CITY -- The design achievements of Finland, perhaps the most creative of the Scandinavian countries, were highlighted this season in a number of Finn-focused activities marking the country's 80th birthday. The most prominent of these was, of course, the Museum of Modern Art's important Alvar Aalto exhibition. In a more intimate New York venue, however, the Bard Graduate Center's presentation of "Finnish Modern Design: Utopian Ideals and Everyday Realities, 1930-1997" offers a broader, and more illuminating, view of Finnish design.

The exhibition through July 12 features more than 140 objects in a variety of materials, by internationally known designers as well as others whose names will be new to most visitors. Its diversity points up the originality, ingenuity, and ongoing concern with humane issues that characterize the designs of this fascinating country.

In the middle years of this century, Scandinavian design became celebrated for its accessible approach to modernism, and the warmth and humanity of its products captivated an international market. In the process, Scandinavia was often regarded as a single entity, rather than five different, though related nations. Denmark, Iceland, Finland, Norway, and Sweden share a great deal of history, but each has its own characteristics and design identity. In particular, Finland, separated from its neighbors by language as well as geographic barriers, took its own idiosyncratic path to modernism. Drawing inspiration from historic folklore, the Finns translated it into individualistic designs that provided them both national identity and international recognition.

With a third of its land above the Arctic circle, Finland has a geography of striking contrasts. Mostly plateau, it has an abundance of trees - its greatest natural resource - and no less than 60,000 lakes. About the size of Germany, it has a population of only five million people in 131,000 square miles. The country was essentially a peasant culture until beyond the turn of the century, with a history of subjugation that created an urgent need for identity of its own.

Although it was part of the Kalmar Union that briefly joined Denmark and Sweden in 1387, Finland was for most of its history merely an adjunct of more powerful neighbors. In 1808, after the Napoleonic Wars, it was traded to Russia, from which it declared independence only in 1918. Coming late into the modern world, the country lacked heritage or strong traditions of its own. It found them in the forgotten culture of the region of Karelia, with the translation and publication of the Kaleyala in 1835. This folk epic became a touchstone for nationalistic feeling as well as inspiration for the first uniquely Finnish designs.

These debuted in 1900, at the Exposition Internationale in Paris, in a pavilion that drew international attention for its integrated design concept. It was the work of a young architectural firm - Gesellius, Saarinen and Lindgren. Eliel Saarinen, Eero's father, later emigrated to America to direct the Cranbrook Institute and influence the first generation of homegrown American Modernists. The pavilion's interiors, and those of the architects' celebrated studio-house Hvittrask, had murals and textiles by Aleksi Gallen-Kallela, an artist who sought a new aesthetic that was truly original and intrinsically Finnish.

Finnish design development was facilitated by a supportive government and strong crafts organizations that encouraged creative experimentation by young artists and helped market their work. Design competitions, initiated as early as 1905, were used by the country's enterprising manufacturers as a means of finding new talent, as well as for developing objects to be shown at international exhibitions and world's fairs.

These events became perhaps the most effective marketing tools for Finnish design, and for the country itself, providing wide exposure for the most creative work by a new generation of designers. Most of these were trained by Arttu Brummer, a celebrated glass designer who taught at, and then headed Helsinki's Central School of Arts and Crafts between 1919 and 1951.

As Finland developed an aesthetic of modernity, its designs focused on available materials, and on filling basic needs. Lacking natural resources such as gold, gems or exotic woods, they worked with what they had. A focus on everyday objects was dictated by austerity and postwar shortages, and the Finns made these objects as beautiful as the luxury goods they also produced. Viewing design as a way of life rather than merely fashion, they made products which were functional and comfortable to use, as well as affordable for as many people as possible.

Alvar Aalto, whose designs in bent laminated birch plywood are among the most familiar classics of modern furniture, was the first Finn to draw international attention. Admiring the Bauhaus modern aesthetic, he rejected its reliance on metal, which he considered inappropriate for residential interiors. He focused his attention on native Finnish wood and organic forms, employing modern laminating and molding techniques to find new potential in a familiar material.

Several examples of Aalto's early designs are in the Bard exhibition, as well as his equally famous Savoy vase, whose undulating shape in ordinary soda glass was created in 1936 and exhibited in the Paris Exposition of 1937. Aalto's fame on a broader scale was ensured with the New York World's Fair of 1939, when the striking interior of curving wood walls and evocative photographs created a compelling design identity for Finland, and awakened many Americans to a new, and accessible, approach to Modern design.

Kaj Franck, less widely known but with considerable influence on modern Finnish design, was artistic director for both Arabia, Finland's most important ceramic firm (originally founded in 1873 as a subsidiary of Swedish manufacturer Rohrstrand), and for Nuutajaavi Glassworks. His ingenious and enduring concepts for glass and ceramic design concentrated on production efficiency and practical applications. Kilta, which introduced the concept of interchangeable, modular pieces to dinnerware, was first produced in 1948, and is still being made today, updated only for usability in a microwave.

Tapio Wirkkala, the next Finn to become an international celebrity, was discovered by Iittalla Glassworks in a 1946 competition, and his painstaking experiments with recreating the textures of natural wood and water in manufactured glass have since become familiar in objects from table glasses to candlesticks to vodka bottles. It was, however, his laminated-wood leaf platter, shown in the Wirkkala-designed Finnish pavilion at the 1951 Milan Triennale and hailed by House Beautiful as the "most beautiful object of 1951," that first propelled him onto an international stage.

Wirkkala continued to design the award-winning Finnish exhibits at the 1954 Triennale, and in Brussels in 1958, securing Finland's its position as one of the most important sources of innovative, modern design. The exhibition at Bard includes less familiar Wirkkala designs, in metal and glass, as well as famous works such as the leaf platter and the 1946 Kantarelli vase.

Deservedly sharing the limelight, Timo Sarpaneva, whose Orkhidea vase was House Beautiful's "most beautiful object of 1952," became known primarily for his sculptural works in crystal. As the exhibition illustrates, however, he also designed cookware as admirable in appearance as it was functional in use. His red enameled cookpot sits in the showcase like a piece of sculpture.

Finnish designers, more than those in other Scandinavian countries, were eager to embrace new materials as well as their native wood. Most notable among these was Eero Aarnio, whose conversation-piece Ball chair and smile-provoking Pastilli (called Gyro in this country and included in the exhibition) utilized the possibilities of plastic with abandon and without apology.

Among the younger generation of designers whose work is shown to illustrate the continuing creativity of the Finns, Antti Nurmesniemi and Yrjo Kukkapuro have explored the combination of function and accessibility in designs, for residential and commercial use, that use mass-production techniques without abandoning the appeal of natural materials or organic forms.

Although all of the Scandinavian countries make the shaggy carpets known as rya, it is the Finns who are credited with originating the "ryiji" rug, originally used as wallhangings or bed coverings in the cold climate, and viewed with the same regard as were tapestries in France. Gallen-Kallela's Flame, shown in Paris in 1900, was the first modern ryiji, and inspired the diverse and sophisticated creations produced by Twentieth Century Finnish artisans, many from the Friends of Finnish Handicrafts. The single example in the exhibition is complemented by examples of various woven and embroidered works that reflect the folkloric origins of the country's handicraft.

In the 1960s, a new wave in textile design emerged from Finland, led by Armi Rattia, whose Marimekko firm produced simple cottons in bold, overscale prints created by her artist friends. These, along with similarly exuberant creations from another designer, Vuokko, became popular wallhangings and were translated into comfortable tent-shape garments, bed coverings and linens. Several examples of these lively pieces in the show recall their uninhibited appeal and their reflection of the Pop Art motifs of the period.

In addition to their considerable contributions to contemporary furniture and tableware, Finnish designers of the Twentieth Century created exquisite and original jewelry, and the exhibition includes a number of pieces by leading designers and craftsmen. Among them are Bertel Gardberg, Bjorn Weckstrom, and Saara Hopea, whose sculptural pieces, mostly in silver, use simple shapes and striking semi-precious stones rather than conventional gem-cut ones.

Several pieces of industrial equipment, including pipettes and a diver's compass, remind us that Finns continue to design utilitarian objects with care. Also included are tableware, ceramics, graphics and lighting to further illustrate the range of Finnish hand-crafted and industrial design.

The Bard installation is surprisingly understated, in deference to the simplicity of the objects themselves, allowing the subtlety and humanity of the designs to stand on their own, which, on examination, they prove to do without benefit of background support. Arranged more or less chronologically, the exhibition presents Finnish modern design in many guises from its inception almost to the present day. Although the most outstanding objects are concentrated in the middle years of the century, the most recent works illustrate the bent for ingenious experimentation and the openness to ideas that are the ongoing characteristics of design in this creative country.

"Finnish Modern Design: Utopian Ideals and Everyday Realities 1930-1997," was curated jointly by Marianne Aav, curator of the Museum of Art and Design in Helsinki, and Nina Stritzler-Levine, director of exhibitions at The Bard Graduate Center in New York. A copiously illustrated catalogue includes scholarly essays providing a social and cultural context for the exhibition and insight into the Finnish approach to design.

The Bard Graduate Center is at 18 West 86th Street, 212/501-3000.