The quiet, introspective delight of Finland’s car cruising scene

This story is originally published in Huck 83: Life Is a Journey – The 20^th Anniversary Issue. Order your copy now.

It’s a rite of passage. A time when the youth have finally become young adults and can head out on their own with friends. They drive huge loops over and over again, just to have somewhere to hang out. It’s an intimate space where friendships and love blooms. In Jussi Puikkonen’s latest photobook, Cruise, the photographer spent nearly half a decade documenting the culture and making sense of the enormity that having a car means to those that do it.

How does cruising in Finland differ to somewhere like Los Angeles? The cars seem less, let’s say, tuned up? Is the purpose of pilluralli just to drive, not to show off?

I am not a specialist in Los Angeles car culture, so I cannot speak about it in depth. But from what I understand and have observed from afar, car culture there is often closely tied to spectacle, visibility, customisation, and performance. In Finland, especially in smaller northern towns, it feels more introspective. There are beautifully restored American classics and tuned engines, of course, but the culture is not primarily competitive.

Cruising is less about showing off and more about circulating and being part of a moving community. The car functions almost like a private room. Warm, enclosed, intimate. That inward-facing quality became central to my photobook Cruise, where the focus is less on the cars themselves and more on the atmosphere inside them.

Is the moment you get a car in northern Finland the moment you become an adult?

Yes. Public transport is limited and distances are long. The driver’s license brings literal autonomy. You are no longer dependent on your parents’ schedules. You control your movement and you control your space. That shift carries symbolic weight. In Cruise, I was interested in that threshold moment, the car as a rite of passage and as the first object that truly extends your personal freedom. 

The feeling of independence must be amazing for them! 

It is, especially in a landscape defined by long winters and isolation. Inside the car, music is loud, friends are close, the road is open. Even if you are driving the same loop repeatedly, the act of choosing to continue feels powerful.

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Cruising through ​“nightless night” is something most cultures won’t experience. Can you take us through that? 

In the Nordic summer, the sun barely sets. The light softens but never fully disappears. You might start driving at 10pm and suddenly it is 3am, but the sky is still glowing. Without darkness to signal closure, time stretches. Cruising in that suspended light feels almost dreamlike, as if you exist outside ordinary rhythm. That atmosphere is fundamental to Cruise.

Did you cruise as a youth? What car did you drive if you did? 

I grew up in a small village, so the culture is very familiar to me. It was part of the landscape of my teenage years. But I moved to Helsinki at a relatively young age, and instead of spending my evenings behind the wheel, I often found myself sitting in the city’s trams.

In a way, that shift gave me both proximity and distance. I understood the codes and the atmosphere from the inside, but I also stepped away early enough to observe it later with a different perspective.

How have things changed in the scene in the four-plus years you’ve been documenting it?

In my eyes, not dramatically. The routes are the same. The rhythm is the same. The slow circulation through town still defines the evenings. What I hear from people, though, is that gatherings are slowly becoming less popular. There are now many other ways to meet, connect, and spend time. Social media, gaming, different subcultures, more digital forms of socialising. The car is no longer the only social arena available to young people. That said, the core ritual still exists. For those who participate, the meaning has not disappeared. If anything, it may feel more intentional now. It is less automatic, perhaps, but still deeply rooted in place and tradition.

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How did you get the drivers and their passengers to trust you for this project?

I was genuinely interested in what they were doing. That was the starting point. I did not approach them with a fixed narrative or an agenda. I was transparent about my motives from the beginning. I told them why I was there, what I was working on, and that this would become a long-term project and eventually a book.

The Finnish are perhaps stereotyped for being socially distant – is this a moment in a Finn’s life when they can be comfortable with friends in a really intimate setting for long periods of time? 

Yes, I think that is true. I once asked a group of young people if they knew everyone who was cruising around them. They said: ​“No, we do not know the people, we only know the cars.” I found that answer very telling. There is both distance and closeness at the same time. Publicly, the atmosphere can feel reserved. People stay inside their vehicles, windows half open, music playing. But inside the car, the intimacy is real. You sit close together for hours. Conversations drift. Silence is shared without discomfort. The car becomes a protected social space. You do not need to perform for the whole crowd. You belong to your small circle.

Some of the drivers clock up 40,000km in a year – is that just because there’s so much distance between towns and villages? Or do they just drive on and on and on? 

Both. Northern Finland has real geographical distances. But 40,000km a year exceeds necessity. It’s repetition – driving the same circuit again and again. One young man told me he had driven roughly the equivalent of circling the globe – without ever leaving his region. That paradox of immense movement within limited geography fascinated me and became one of the conceptual anchors of the project.

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Is the ​“driving without destination” concept an allegory for the stage they’re at in their lives?

I did not begin with that metaphor, but over time it revealed itself. They are constantly moving, yet not necessarily toward something clearly defined. Adulthood is approaching, but not fixed. Futures are open and uncertain. At some point, some of them will leave for bigger cities, for studies, for work. Others will stay and continue driving the same small-town loops, repeating familiar routes that have shaped their teenage years. Cruising becomes a suspended state between childhood and responsibility. Movement without arrival. Energy without a clear direction. Perhaps that is why the project resonates beyond Finland. That in-between state is not only about youth. It is a universal human condition, something I tried to hold onto and reflect throughout Cruise.

Cruise by Jussi Puikkonen is published by Garret Publications.

Josh Jones is Huck’s editor. Follow him on Instagram.

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