How to Create a Scandinavian Interior: A Professional Recipe

Olga Kulikovskaya-Eshbi first attended the Stockholm Furniture Fair and received a lot of vibrant impressions, offering everyone the opportunity to use her recipe for creating a Scandinavian interior by mixing ingredients from the items displayed at the Stockholm fair. Shall we try?

Olga Kulikovskaya-Eshbi is a designer and founder of the Interior Box service, which provides ready-made solutions for interiors in various styles adapted to specific clients. 1. Space

One of the most important elements in our recipe, without which the taste will be off. The space should be bright and airy, with large windows, preferably "full height," even better - with access to a terrace or balcony. Light plays a huge role in Scandinavian interiors.

Beams and cornices will remain on the ceiling if they exist, but we won't add new ones - why bother with unnecessary additions.

Design: Olga Kulikovskaya-Eshbi 2. Color

We mix a restrained palette with white as the dominant color. We introduce gray. One wall we take and highlight in black. Splashes of bright colors are allowed, but more as accents. The trend toward green was reflected in the Stockholm exhibition. Many sofas turned green and were covered in velvet.

3. Materials

For the floor, we choose light wood, bleached, exclusively natural, and preferably with oil instead of lacquer. We lay it like a deck or fir, depending on taste.

We use wood boldly – mainly light woods such as birch, and if desired, we introduce plywood.

We don't pass by metal (bronze, even in small amounts, but still present at the fair). The main color of metal is black, which looks more graphic on light surfaces.

4. Furniture

We choose furniture exclusively comfortable and beautiful in its functionality (this is a key point in Scandinavian design). Personally, I really liked the sofas from ire, &tradition, adea at the fair.

All manufacturers have many models on high legs, which give a sense of lightness in the structure and let light through (and we remember that light is one of the key elements in a Scandinavian interior). Another popular trend: cloud sofa. The shape is smooth, puffy, enveloping. We include such a sofa in our selection.

Chairs and stools are purely functional; I liked chairs with armrests that serve as trays. One of such chairs turned into a sofa-bed. Perhaps the most unexpected chair among all I know.

We won't forget the chaise longue either: their variety among Scandinavian brands is limitless.

Shelves from New Works we take in black and brass, various heights. We won't follow symmetry - it doesn't play a leading role in Scandinavian interiors.

For TV storage, I liked the record player cabinet. The front is fabric, so the remote control will work.

We choose a plush or textured rug, and even a grandmother's path variant works. You can also play it safe by choosing a version with text. My personal favorite at the fair were viscose and wool rugs from &tradition with "trimmed" corners.

This rug shouldn't be hidden, better to place it in the center of the living area so its shape can be fully appreciated. Or, conversely, organize a living area around it. It all depends on the size of your living room.

Side tables made from different materials, a kind of constructor: 3 tables in one. The designer of the year at the Stockholm fair, Haime Aion, made several variants for &tradition.

If you think curtains are dust collectors, leave the windows open. If you must close them, use light linen or heavy and coarse fabric if it's a bedroom, as you like to sleep in darkness.

Lighting is important and necessary. Your mood in the morning and evening differs like day from night, so the level of lighting in the room should correspond to this.

Unexpected and playfully shaped lights were everywhere, often playing an interior-forming role. Vase-style lamps appeared with several brands. Especially nice are stone and glass table lamps, simple in form but rich in texture.

Accessories are few but all perfectly simple. Take the mirror for a makeup table from Menu, for example. I immediately bought it for my project. The huge clocks from New Works stopped my heart for a moment. Beautiful works with colored glass and stone. There was plenty to inspire the designer who pays attention to accessories at the Stockholm fair.

Final Result: Trendy Interior

A few hours of collage work and here is your ready-to-go interior. I hope this simple recipe helps you avoid getting lost in trends and find the right path to your Scandinavian interior.