THE MALMÖ APARTMENT
Creating a home is really a life-long process, but of course, sometimes you leave a home and move on to another. We had so much fun renovating and decorating our former apartment in Malmö (the first home we owned together), and for those of you who haven’t seen it - here’s a little throwback.
A group of rice lamps create a nice and airy feeling. The DIY desk utilizes an often unused space by the window. The TRP Protector blanket adds some color to the beige furniture.
When we bought the place, it was really worn down, the previous owner had been smoking indoors and some cat had gone nuts on the wallpaper - quite creepy to be honest. Good thing was that we lived in a one room apartment just one floor down, and we knew how nice the apartment building was; great garden, great neighbours and a cozy garden. So we took a leap of faith (and all our savings) and bought the place - which we never regretted. After settling in for a while we decided to move the kitchen (which was in a small room) and tear down a wall (despite the fact that open plan living was totally out of fashion according to all interior magazines) to create a big combined kitchen and living room space. It’s so easy to be in a hurry while renovating, but sometimes it really makes sense to think a while longer, to figure out how you really want to use the space.
The kitchen seen from the livingroom with prints from our shop and from Jenny o Jens, photo by Jenny Brandt Grönberg.
Some old building material found on the attic turned out to be a great moodboard for early Tropical Scandinavia sketches. You can find similar ones for next to nothing in any hardware store.
This was where Tropical Scandinavia was born (well this and under the palm trees in the Philippines). Working at home doesn’t suite everyone, but for us it’s great! Not having the stress of an expensive office space and being able to work whenever really helped us get started. If you’re starting a business, remember - you can start super small! The most important thing is that you choose something you really love doing, so you’ll have the energy to stick with it. Another thing that really helped us is that we started out by making a long pdf with moodboards, our goals (business goals yes, but even more what we wanted to give to the world around us and how we wanted to live our life), ideas for products, etc. We spent a lot of time on this, but I think it set a great foundation and a direction for us, which we can always look back on if in doubt. Perhaps ideas for starting out a creative business is a blog post of its own to be written soon? Let us know if you’d like to hear more!
The tiny apartment showroom with wool blankets and cushion covers on display
We even set up a tiny showroom in the apartment, where we occasionally had visitors looking at carpets, finding gifts for their loved ones or just having a coffee and a chat. It turned out to be a great way to meet customers, the home environment made it cozy and it often felt like we just had friends over. Once again, don’t forget to try something out, even if it at first doesn’t seem like you have the perfect circumstances for it.
The kitchen seen from the hallway. The kitchen is from IKEA, with a countertop from Silestone and an ash wood part made by Johannas uncle.
An early sample of Morning Energy cushion on the balcony
Our small but cozy bedroom with Palm Power wool blanket on the bed.
Gallery wall in the hallway, all artworks made by us. Find a version of the Palm Eye print here. Ivar cabinets from IKEA.
Livingroom detail with vase from HAY, pot from Lagerhaus and shelving from IKEA.
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