Launched in 2002 by Stockholm Furniture Fair as a fringe accompaniment to the manufacturers presenting their wares in Stockholmsmässan's halls, Stockholm Design Week has, of late, become ever more a Stockholm Furniture Fair satellite as ever more manufacturers choose to present their wares in their flagship stores in downtown Stockholm rather than in Stockholmsmässan halls.
A shift that, arguably, is partly responsible for the amount of space within those Stockholmsmässan halls, space that manufacturers once occupied. Space that it is difficult to avoid when strolling through Stockholm Furniture Fair.
If a shift that needn't be bad.
Here, sadly, isn't the time nor space for a full discussion, we wish it were, but it can't be; however, if we all accept, as we all should and must accept, that the age of the centralised international furniture fair is past, that furniture fairs are no longer justifiable, that the furniture industry needs new ways to communicate with customers at all levels, then there is an argument that a decentralised event with showroom presentations around a city, something Stockholm Furniture Fair is visibly becoming, is a way forward. Yes, there is still, without question, a need for a central location, central locations, for discussions, presentations, talks, for those manufacturer who don't have a store or a partner store in that city, amongst other needs; but, that location/those locations needn’t be a vast industrial space, every city has much more appealing alternatives. Much as we enjoy Stockholmsmässan. And thus as a model for a possible future incarnation of the furniture fair, that which Stockholm Design Week is becoming is not uninteresting.
What is uninteresting is the, in our perceptions, manner in which while Stockholm Furniture Fair is becoming ever more present during Stockholm Design Week, independent designers and non-commercial showcases and initiatives, those things that, for us, define a design week, are becoming ever less present during Stockholm Design Week. In the past there was a lot more variety and spectacle in the Stockholm Design Week programme, a lot more youth and desire and fun, a lot more contention and speculating and erring, a lot more discussion and experimenting and a lot less commerce. That may be just us and the rose tinted lenses of advancing age, we first visited Stockholm Design Week in 2011, a lot has happened since then, our brains trick us more often than they did then, but in 2025 if you weren't looking for a flagship store presentation then you were really struggling. And back in the day, in our ageing, aged, memories, that wasn't the case. It was more the case that you were really struggling to juggle your diary to squeeze everything in. This year our diary had as much free space as Stockholmsmässan's halls.
A state of affairs exemplified for us by the fact that in 2025 several prominent locations who in years past have been compulsory go tos, had either nothing on show, or so little they genuinely needn't have bothered.
And a state of affairs, we'd argue, that is related to the shifting relationship between Stockholm Furniture Fair and Stockholm Design Week, that way they are both taking on the role of the other, focussing ever more on that which the other once did. Indeed all of our posts thus far from Stockholm Furniture Fair 2025 far have been from the Greenhouse platform or feature non-brands i.e. the sort of showcases that should be at a design week dominate at the fair, and that which should be at the fair dominates design week.
And, no, we haven't manipulated our publication schedule so that we could make that point, although, yes, had it occurred to us we probably would have. Rather it is genuinely indicative of that which we discovered in Stockholmsmässan's halls. The vast majority of the interesting stuff wasn't on manufacturers' stands. Although some was.
Thus a Stockholm 2025 that provided plenty of room for thought on how one guarantees the co-existence of commerce and culture, the established, the establishing and the anti-establishment that not only any design week/furniture fair needs, but the furniture and design industries need and which fairs/design weeks should help cultivate and advance. A Stockholm 2025 that provided plenty of room for thought on the way forward for the furniture industry and the furniture fair. And not just room for thought in the spaces in Stockholmsmässan's halls.
And despite our grousing and lamenting Stockholm Design Week 2025 did provide for a few interesting moments, and in the coming days and weeks we will bring you some of our reflections on some of those works and projects and positions experienced, and some of our reflections on Stockholm Design Week 2025.......
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