Sense of now

My Sanctuary and Your holiday haven – Arcticmint, A Family Villa near Rovaniemi, Finnish Lapland

Long before Arcticmint had a name, it was my grandmother's home.

Then my mother's. Then mine.

When I was little, I remember pancakes on the stove, Finnish dance music on the radio, and grandma dancing around in a big, floppy sun hat like nobody was watching — even though her two granddaughters absolutely were.

We're Finns. We don't say “I love you” every five minutes. We didn't need to. You knew, because she was always there, and it always felt the same. My sister and I visited grandma and grandpa for as long as they lived, and this place became our sanctuary.

It wasn't just her, though she was most of it. It was the lake. The silence you could actually hear.

Endless summer days spent fishing, building rafts, getting lost in the forest and finding our way back before dark — the kind of freedom kids don't really get anymore.

That mix of adventure and quiet is rare, and once you've had it as a child, you spend the rest of your life trying to get back to it.

Still today, when I drive up to the lake, my heart rate drops. Every time.

My mother built the villa next to grandma's old house years later. Same land, same lake, one more generation stacked on top.

I dreamed about sharing this place for years — then life got busy, the way it does. It wasn't until my son was born and I stayed home with him that the dream finally had room to breathe.

So I opened Arcticmint. And funnily enough, guests keep telling me the same thing my own childhood taught me: they haven't played together like this in years, or spent this much time without a screen in hand.

The lake, the silence, the forest — it does the same thing to grown-ups that it did to me as a kid.

And that is the whole point. Not a bigger sauna or a fancier anything (though our lakeside sauna is about 100 years old and has never once tried to be fancy).

It's the sense of now that's hard to find anywhere else.

– Jaana

Your hostess at Arcticmint Villa & Experiences, Rovaniemi, Lapland, Finland