Growing up at the Finnish-Swedish border region definitely affected my interests in geography, borders and different cultures. Back then, I found it interesting, but also confusing, how the physically open border area was somewhat distant and inaccessible to me personally. This observation has led me to study the dynamics of cross-border co-operation from different social, cultural, and political aspects for almost 15 years. With this background, I’m extremely excited to be part of the B-SHAPES project. Our team’s focus is on border landscapes, and it’s intriguing to further study how material border landscapes are perceived by local people, and how these perceptions can be utilized in the planning and conservation of border landscapes in the future. To make our research results more visible to the public, we’ll produce digital StoryMaps which I’m very enthusiastic about!