Who Is Oona Gray Seppälä? Everything to Know About Sarah Rafferty’s Daughter

Oona Gray Seppala is known to the public for one main reason: she is the eldest daughter of Sarah Rafferty, the actress loved around the world as Donna Paulsen in Suits. Her father is Santtu Seppala, a Finnish American finance professional. Between an actress mother and a private father, Oona grew up close to fame but not inside it.

This article keeps strictly to the public record, and it stays brief and respectful where the record is brief. Oona was a minor for most of the years covered here, and her parents have shared only selected moments of her life. What follows is what reputable reporting, mainly People magazine’s family coverage, actually documents.

Quick Facts

Born Into a Yale Love Story

Oona Gray Seppala was born on October 22, 2007, the first child of Sarah Rafferty and Santtu Seppala. Her parents’ story began at Yale University, where Rafferty earned a Master of Fine Arts in drama and Seppala completed his undergraduate studies before taking an MBA at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. They married on June 23, 2001, at St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Rafferty came from Hamilton College, where she graduated with a double major in English and theatre, and built a stage and television career before her defining role arrived. Seppala, born in Illinois to a Finnish family, built his career in finance and investment, work that has kept him almost entirely out of public view. Their daughter’s upbringing would always sit between those two poles: a very public mother at work, and a very private father at home.

Oona’s younger sister, Iris Friday Seppala, was born in January 2012. Rafferty has said in interviews that her life revolves around her children, and that she works to keep an open and honest relationship with both daughters, a theme she returned to in interviews while the girls were growing up.

Childhood Between Los Angeles and Toronto

In 2011, Rafferty was cast as Donna Paulsen in Suits, the legal drama that ran for nine seasons and made her famous worldwide. The show filmed in Toronto, so the family lived a bicoastal life between Los Angeles and Toronto for most of Oona’s childhood. As a result, she attended schools in two cities, an arrangement Rafferty discussed openly in a 2013 Redbook interview.

Rafferty admitted she had worried about the two school setup, but said it became an amazing, self esteem building experience for her daughter, who came to celebrate it. Both girls enjoyed visiting the Suits set, where their favourite stops, according to their mother, were the craft services truck, the hair and makeup trailer, and the fitting rooms. It is a small, human picture of a childhood spent partly inside a television production.

The Suits cast formed close real life friendships, and Rafferty’s bond with her co stars, including Gabriel Macht and Meghan Markle, became part of the family’s world. Rafferty and Seppala were guests at the wedding of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry in May 2018, a measure of how close those working friendships became during Oona’s childhood years.

A Mother’s Public Words, a Daughter’s Private Life

Most of what the public knows about Oona comes from her mother’s own chosen sharing: birthday posts, occasional family photographs, and interview answers about parenting. On Oona’s thirteenth birthday in 2020, Rafferty posted a photograph of her daughter before a birthday cake and wrote about officially having a teenager, saying the family loved her so much they had to sing it from the mountaintops.

In a 2016 interview, when Oona was eight, Rafferty explained that she was teaching her elder daughter to be true to herself and to know she could talk to her parents about absolutely anything. She said she hoped Oona would move through the world independently with confidence, because she felt deeply connected to her family and knew home was a safe space for any conversation.

Those two themes, independence and connection, are the whole public story of Oona’s upbringing, and deliberately so. Some websites claim careers, social media empires, or performing ambitions for her without strong evidence. Reputable reporting does not document a public career for Oona, and this article does not invent one. Where the record is silent, the respectful answer is that her life is her own.

Heritage and Family Background

Oona’s heritage joins two distinct family cultures. From her father she carries Finnish roots, reflected in the family surname Seppala and in her own middle landscape of Finnish names within the wider family. From her mother she carries an American theatrical tradition built through Hamilton College, Oxford study, and Yale drama training.

That mix shaped a household where education mattered on both sides. Her father holds degrees from Yale and Wharton and works in strategy and investment. Her mother holds an MFA and has spoken often about craft and preparation. Whatever path Oona chooses as an adult, the family example offers her both the arts and the professions as normal, respected routes.

Rafferty’s own career has continued into a new chapter with the Netflix series My Life with the Walter Boys, which brought her a Children’s and Family Emmy nomination in 2024 and introduced her to a younger audience, many of whom then discovered Suits during its streaming revival. Through all of it, she has kept her daughters’ exposure limited and chosen, a consistency that defines the family’s public record.

What Comes Next Is Hers to Announce

Oona turned eighteen in October 2025, stepping into adulthood with something rare for a celebrity child: an almost clean public slate. There are no childhood scandals in her record, no reality shows, no monetised account of her school years. There is a birth date, two parents, a sister, two home cities, and a handful of warm quotes from her mother. That is the documented whole of it.

If she chooses a public career, in acting or in any other field, reliable coverage will record it and this article can be updated from real events. If she chooses privacy like her father, the public record will stay exactly as short as it is today, and that outcome should be understood as a success of her parents’ approach rather than a gap to be filled with guesses.

Oona Gray Seppala’s story, as far as the public is entitled to it, is a family story: a Yale romance that became a long marriage, a hit television show that moved a household between two countries, and two daughters raised with open doors at home and closed doors to the press. Everything beyond that belongs, properly, to her.

FAQs

Who is Oona Gray Seppala?

She is the eldest daughter of actress Sarah Rafferty and finance professional Santtu Seppala, born on October 22, 2007. She has a younger sister, Iris, born in 2012.

Why did Oona Gray Seppala grow up in two cities?

Her mother filmed Suits in Toronto while the family also lived in Los Angeles. Rafferty has said Oona attended schools in both cities and came to enjoy the experience.

What does Sarah Rafferty say about raising Oona?

Rafferty has said she teaches her daughters to be true to themselves and to talk to their parents about anything, and that her life revolves around her children.

Is Oona Gray Seppala an actress?

Strong public sources do not document a public acting career for her. Claims on low quality websites are unverified, and her life remains private by her family’s choice.

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Final Thoughts

Oona Gray Seppala is documented in public mainly as a beloved daughter in a close family, and that is the right size for her story. A Suits childhood across two countries, a Finnish American heritage, and parents who shared sparingly are the verified facts.

As an adult, any next chapter will be hers to start and hers to share. Until real reporting exists, the respectful summary stands: a private young woman from a well loved television family.

Featured photo: Sarah Rafferty – photo by Fuzheado, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons