Young Swedish Design

Larvae, food waste and brain matter on the menu

The design circus opens again in Stockholm, with the Furniture & Light Fair in Älvsjö and numerous events all over town. What should we look for this time? We asked the industry, and got 14 interesting answers.

Material research, cross-over crafts and the identity crisis of ordinary things – the new design generation shows a growing interest in sustainability and human interaction. On the following pages, we present the 20 talents that were elected for Young Swedish Design this year.

Young Swedish Design is an annual, juried design award and exhibition tour run by Svensk Form, the Swedish Society of Crafts and Design, since 1998. Behind the project is a range of partners, from IKEA to Stockholm Furniture & Light Fair. Here, they explain why they have chosen to get involved.

The decision to close the doors of the Röhsska Museum caught both officials and the public by surprise. But is the closure of the museum a desperate measure by politicians or just what is needed for a fresh start?

In a basement in Old Town, Stockholm, seats for Josef Frank’s classics are being woven by hand. Pontus Dahlman and Carl Hjelte visit a workshop where time has stood still for 70 years.

The future hasn’t been this depressing since the Cold War. But the science and design community is oering resistance, with a range of climate adaptation strategies. Salka Hallström Bornold highlights eleven Nordic solutions – including poo power, algae burgers and magnetic motorways.

During his lifetime, he designed more than 500 buildings. But today, he’s almost forgotten. Bo Madestrand remembers Sture Frölén, starchitect of the Swedish welfare state era.

What is it with Finnish design that makes it so different? Salka Hallström Bornold reads an astonishing article on the relationship between design and language, and suddenly sees her own Haapaniemi tableware in a new light.