ESTONIA

Despite the official opening of the Estonia piano factory in 1950, Estonia’s history really begins in 1893, when piano builder Ernst Hiis formed his own company and began producing pianos in the small Eastern-European country of Estonia. After building pianos for several other companies over the next 50 odd years, virtually every piano factory in Estonia was destroyed during WWII and the ensuing occupation of Estonia by the Soviet Union. In 1950, at the behest of Joseph Stalin, the Tallinn Piano Factory was established under the direction of Ernst Hiis to provide pianos for the Soviet Union. The pianos they produced would be called Estonia; thus the brand was established.

A state-owned Estonian company from 1950 until 1990, the quality of Estonia would gradually decline, especially after the death of Ernst Hiis in 1964. After the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the company found itself in dire straits with major inconsistencies in regards to quality, but privatization and a gradual takeover by Julliard graduate Indrek Laul would ultimately save the company and set it on the path to prosperity.