On friday 4 of June we organized a design meeting in Jönköping. The day was arranged by myself and my friend Dag Holmgren, with support from Swedish Association for Designers, SVID – Swedish Industrial Design Foundation and Svensk Form - Swedish Society of Crafts and Design.

It was a really nice day, filled with interesting speakers and opportunities to network and meet new friends. Almost 80 participants, mostly designers but also producers and representatives from swedish design organizations.

Among the speakers we heard Peter Horbury – Vice President of Design at Volvo Cars, Lars Johansson – founder of Profilgruppen AB, Carina Mollsö – Designer at Scandinavian Eyewear, Lotta Ahlvar - Swedish Association for Designers / The Swedish Fashion Council, Gisela Mattisson and Christer Ericson – SVID, Britt-Marie Börjesgård – Svensk Form, Anders Wisth – Designregion Småland / Möbelriket.

Made a trip to Denmark last monday for a meeting with the nordic design organizations. The sun was shining, the birds were singing and all the danes were drinking beer in the open-air restaurants. We had our lunch, or  as you say it in danish - ”frokost”, at a place named Kanalen. Good food and nice interior; noticed the classic Y-chair designed by Hans Wegner. Copenhagen is a great city and a perfect spot to get a glimpse of the early summer. I took a few photos with my lousy mobile camera, poor quality I know, but good enough for the blog. Cheers!

Together with Svid, Almi and the business network Design Sydost I gave a lecture about creating value with design last week. The target group was sme companies in the region wondering what design can do for them, and also how and where to get in touch with design.

The meeting was held in Vimmerby (the home town of famous author Astrid Lindgren!). Except of me representing my own company; Design Nation and Swedish Designers, the speakers was Martina Lago from Almi and Johan Malmquist from Addi.

After the presentations we did a study visit to the successful light company Zobra where the manager Michael Engstrand showed us the plant and the products.

When SVID, The Swedish Industrial Design Foundation, arranged a field trip within Design Management, I was there representing Swedish Association of Designers. The place for the study was Materia in Tranås; a natural choice, since the company is really skilled within the area. The comprehensive approach of Materia is very impressive, how every little detail is carefully thought out, and how all together bringing out the core values to get very clear – internally and externally.

Design management is also one of my special working areas. To introduce design thinking in the company strategy – management by design. I often have to prove and convince about the importance of design management. What’s the profit? Well, Materia is the perfect example:
Materia was founded in 1992 by Kersti Sandin and Lars Bülow. Materia has quickly grown into one of the most prominent design companies in the industry, with a turnover on 140 mSEK and 62 employees.

It was a very interesting and informative day, with lectures from Robin Edman – CEO SVID, Lisbeth Svengren Holm – Head of Research and Education SVID, Lars Bülow – CEO Materia and Kersti Sandin Bülow Director of Design Materia.

Wednesday 27.5 the Swedish Association of Designers (Sveriges designer) had their annual meeting in Stockholm.

When selecting the new board I was one of the nominated. Of course I accepted the offer. I feel very honored and excited to contribute. The position gives an opportunity to influence in the organization, it also gives new interesting contacts. 

The Swedish Association of Designers is a trade organization for professional designers based in Sweden. Members of the organization are from following areas: Fashion Design, Furniture Design, Graphic Design, Industrial Design, Interactive Design, Product Design, Textile Design, Web design. The Swedish Association of Designers is also member of Beda and Icsid.

Investigations show that design has a sustained strong position, and that the extent of using design has increased. It is clearly a growing market for design, but also a growing understanding on how design can be applied amongst companies, business organizations and the Swedish government.

The meeting was held at a really nice site in Gamla stan, the design studio Ohlssonsmith. After all the formalities we gathered on the top of the roof for ecological wine and snacks in the sunset. Very romantic!

Lotta Ahlvar, Tomas Seo and Claes Frössen in the sun…