Log cabins on the prairie evoke thoughts of pioneer days: warm fires, rough winters, the brave and independent spirit.
The image is pure American.
But the design is a Scandinavian masterpiece.
Forget about Danish Modern for a moment; forget about teak. A new appreciation of Scandinavian style is touching the American design scene, spawning influential new stores, museum exhibits, articles and books.
What`s being noticed now is bigger than teak. It ranges instead from traditional crafts to products for the handicapped, from Danish Modern (still popular here) to the newest experimental furniture.
There`s no set look, a concept that shatters the old stereotype about teak. Instead, Americans are picking up on the many faces of true Scandinavian style. One is country; one is sleek, super-functional furniture.
And in the next few years, we may see radical departures by young furniture designers, struggling to find their own esthetic.
”I think `Scandinavian style` is a bit of a misnomer, because what the Scandinavians are least interested in is style,” says
Elizabeth Gaynor, author of ”Scandinavia: Living Design” (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, $35). ”They`re interested in making the best use of things around them. In solving real problems. In designing for the disabled, for children, for forgotten segments of society.
”In producing beautiful things of long-lasting value that defy one single style category.”
Most of the designs, both old and new, come out of Sweden, Denmark and Finland; the furniture industries in Norway and Iceland are generally considered too small to be influential.
The new, broad Scandinavian style, as we are coming to know it, is a love of natural materials and natural solutions: a garland of dry moss stuffed between double-windows, for example, to stop drafts and absorb humidity.
It`s a log cabin, elegant in its simplicity, first built here by Swedish
settlers 350 years ago. A low door kept the heat in and the stone hearth sat high, blanketing the ceiling with smoke but not choking the air. The design worked with nature, rather than fighting it.
Scandinavian style still pays homage to its old classics, such Georg Jensen jewelery (sold mostly in the company`s New York store) and Marimekko fabrics (sold locally at Crate & Barrel). A best seller for 51 years now is Finnish architect Alvar Aalto`s glass vase; its wide, free-form mouth allows flowers to fall freely, as if spilling from someone`s hand.
Scandinavian style is supremely functional: a high-sided plate that slopes toward the front, enabling a blind or disabled person to neatly round up his food with a fork.
And Scandinavian style is a passion for home, not surprising in lands where long hours of darkness can drive people indoors.
At the other extreme are the brave new designs from the latest Scandinavian Furniture Fair, held in May. A handful of young designers and architects, mostly Danish and Finnish, shook up this year`s fair by working with bright colors, metal, bright lacquer and black.
One coffee table had an irregular edge, as if fire had nibbled at its borders; another table sat on fat, shiny rings of anodized aluminum. Chairs and tables adjusted in height for growing children-a typical Scandinavian emphasis on function-but were brightly lacquered, which designers there have rarely done to wood.
It`s all very alien to most Scandinavians, who do not believe in trends. Their style is to hone a design to classic perfection, then keep it, unchanged, for years.
”Honesty in design is such a big thing for them,” says Judith Masatir, associate product editor of Interior Design magazine.
But now the Scandinavians are competing against the Italians, who have a great reputation for modern, experimental and fast-changing design.
They`re competing against their own entrenched image, which has not changed in American eyes since the 1950s, when mass-produced versions of the great Danish Modern classics first appeared here.
”The great Scandinavian designs are some of the most beautiful and functional objects in the world,” Masatir says. Indeed, one of the most famous contemporary chairs around-Arne Jacobsen`s rounded black Egg chair-is a 28-year-old Danish creation that survives as an icon today.
Designs from the Egg chair era ”are so unusual,” says David Pinson, whose Chicago company Boomerang deals in `50s furniture. ”They have personalities. They`re functional. They`re unbelievably comfortable. They`re visually stimulating. They`re like sculpture, but sculpture you can use.”
Still, many of these modern designs ”are now 30 years old,” Masatir points out, ”and the Scandinavians are finding it difficult to find the next generation of designers.”
Finally, the Scandinavians are racing against the falling dollar, which has sliced deeply into exports to America. Between 1985 and 1987, for example, the Danes` income from these exports dropped almost by half.
”We feel a lot more competition from other countries, especially Italy and West Germany, and we have to think in new ways,” says Georg Schutt, spokesman for the Danish Furniture Manufacturers Association. ”So in the last two years, a lot of young designers have created new things.”
If the new furnishings catch on internationally, it will mark the first time that young Scandinavian designers have stepped out from the shadow of their famous architect-designer forebears: Aalto in Finland, Hans Wegner and Fin Juhl in Denmark, Bruno Mathsson in Sweden.
Americans, however, are more likely to embrace Scandinavian country, the clean, homespun look explored in Gaynor`s book.
”We`re having antiques reproduced, especially in Denmark, and contemporizing them,” says Robert W. Darvin, founder and president of Scandinavian Design, an American chain of 70 stores based in Natick, Mass.
”We started a year and a half ago.” Customers, he adds, are growing tired of Danish Modern`s ”straight edges.”
(Curiously, two big, competing chains of stores have the name Scandinavian Design. The one based in Natick is larger. The other, based in Evanston, is being reorganized under Chapter 11. Executives at the Evanston chain declined to be interviewed.)
The timing of Scandinavian country`s arrival here could not be better. Its warmth, love of handiwork and lack of frivolity is a neat match for American country, and it`s hitting here just as American country sheds its ruffles, honoring instead the pared-down, the eclectic, the personal touch.
But for most Americans, Scandinavian design is still a 30-year-old stereotype, frozen since the mid `50s.
Danish Modern sold wildly for about 10 years, then lost its trendiness. But something curious happened: Exports continued to rise. In chains such as the two Scandinavian Designs, sales of Danish Modern and teak continued to thrive. And to most people, Danish Modern remains the last word in
Scandinavian style.
Now, that stereotype is probably the biggest obstacle for Scandinavian designers seeking change.
”One of the big problems in North America is that people historically associate Scandinavian style with teak,” says Bjoyn Bayley, who heads the American branch of the Swedish furniture-store chain IKEA (pronounced eye-KEY- a). ”Our surveys show us that teak is one reason people are not going to IKEA stores. But we don`t have any teak.”
IKEA`s is yet another version of Scandinavian style-more youthful than country, more pared-down than the radical experiments from the Copenhagen fair. Its 78 furniture stores (including the first two in the U.S., near Boston and Washington, D.C.) sell inexpensive, clean-lined furniture that the buyer lugs home in a flat package and assembles himself.
Finally, behind the new awareness of Scandinavian style (or styles), there`s a fair amount of hype.
This year marked the 350th anniversary of New Sweden, the first Swedish colony in the United States. It started in Delaware and lasted only 17 years, but the Swedes have transformed that brief episode into a year-long storm of publicity.
One result: a swarm of museum exhibitions, many focusing on design, including one here that ran through June at the Merchandise Mart. (A smaller exhibit in the State of Illinois Building made a point of steering credit for the log cabin to the Swedes.)
”Americans consider Scandinavia as one country,” says Judith Gura, a publicist for manufacturers` groups in Denmark, Sweden and Finland. ”They don`t understand the differences. But if Swedish design is being played up, that`s good for all the countries.” –
