Designer Desire: Mari Simmulson

Mosaic of Mari Simmulson designs | H is for Home

Born in St Petersburg, Mari Simmulson (1911-2000) was an Estonian-Swedish ceramic designer. After art school in Tallinn and Munich, she first went to work for Arabia in Finland. From there, she emigrated to Sweden producing designs for Gustavsberg between 1945 & 49 before moving on to Upsala Ekeby until 1972.

She primarily produced plates, plaques, vases and small sculptures. Like Laila Zink, who we featured in this series a couple of weeks ago, a recurring motif in Simmulson’s work was beautiful, almond-eyed women and animals such as birds, cats and fish.

Her work is surprisingly affordable and is often available on Etsy and eBay.

Portrait of Mari Simmulsoncredit

Additional image credits:

Bukowskis

Designer Desire: Lisa Larson

Mosaic of Lisa Larson's ceramic work | H is for Home

Born in 1931, Lisa Larson is a Swedish ceramic designer. She worked for Gustavsberg, under Stig Lindberg, from the 1954 through to 1980 when she branched out on her own working for, amongst others, Royal Krona, Duka, Åhléns department stores and Kooperativa Förbundet.

Larson is probably best known for her small sculptures of animals and children of the world, but we absolutely adore her glazed tiles. The Viking ship at the top right of the mosaic is ours – and we’ve also got an elephant. So, it’s a collection of just two at the moment – but we’ve always got our eyes peeled hoping to happen across more. 🙂 

As you can probably tell, Larson is an animal lover – but she verges on the obsessive when it comes to cats!

Lisa Larson with a collection of her cat figures with a siamese cat on her shouldercredit

If you have a look at the short film below, she has the most beautiful sculpture of a cat which just begs to be stroked – so tactile. If you don’t speak Swedish, you can turn on subtitles by clicking on the left icon (next to the one that looks like a cog) along the bottom panel.

Image credits:
1st Dibs | Etsy | eBay

The elephant in the room

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Vintage Gustavsberg Lisa Larson elephant tile with mugs of cacti

We’ve chosen this fabulous wall plaque that we bought on Monday as the week’s favourite buy. It’s only Wednesday, but we don’t think we’ll better it in the next few days!

Vintage Gustavsberg Lisa Larson elephant tile

This particular elephant in the room is the work of Swedish designer Lisa Larson – produced at the renowned Gustavsberg factory where she worked for over two decades.

Detail from a vintage Gustavsberg Lisa Larson elephant tile

We love the design – the raised, textured decoration forming the elephant and riders’ decorative costumes. The colourway is very attractive too with gorgeous cool blues and chalky whites.

Detail from a vintage Gustavsberg Lisa Larson elephant tile showing signature stamp

The condition is very good; it has the ‘Lisa L’ stamp to the front of the plaque and Gustavsberg paper label to the reverse. Everything a collector would want.

Detail from a vintage Gustavsberg Lisa Larson elephant tile showing the Gustavsberg label

It joins another one of her tiles in the H is for Home shop – a contrasting yet equally fabulous design in the form of a Viking ship.

Vintage Home Show buys!

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vintage homewares bought by H is for Home at the Manchester Vintage Home Show including 1970s Crown wallpaper, 1970s floral tea towel, Swedish plaque of a fish in relief made from copper and tin and designed by Sven Lindström, Gustavsberg 'Grazia' pin dish designed by Stig Lindberg and a '1001 Nights' porcelain charger designed by Bjørn Wiinblad for his Rosenthal Studio Line

We recently blogged about a very enjoyable Sunday morning spent at the Vintage Home Show held at Victoria Baths in Manchester. There were some excellent stalls with all kinds of temptation!

'1001 Nights' porcelain charger designed by Bjørn Wiinblad for his Rosenthal Studio Line

We acquired a few items as we wandered round.

detail from a '1001 Nights' porcelain charger designed by Bjørn Wiinblad for his Rosenthal Studio Line

The first (and most extravagant purchase) was this stunning charger designed by Bjørn Wiinblad. It’s from his 1001 Nights series and was produced by Rosenthal in the 1970s.

detail showing the artist's signature from a "1001 Nights" porcelain charger designed by Bjørn Wiinblad for his Rosenthal Studio Line

We admired it on our first circuit of the venue, picked it up and stroked it on our second circuit – and bought it on the third. We just couldn’t leave it behind!

vintage homewares bought by H is for Home at the Manchester Vintage Home Show including 1970s Crown wallpaper and 1970s floral tea towel

Then a couple of pieces of flower power caught our eye – quite understandable in the case of the zingy coloured tea towel. It was very reasonably priced, so had to be bought.

vintage 1970s floral tea towel

Unused vintage wallpaper is always much in demand. There’s usually enough on a roll to do a feature wall – or it can be used for lining draws/shelves – or various other craft projects.

vintage 1970s Crown wallpaper with floral pattern in browns and orange

On the same stall as the Wiinblad charger, we also spotted this fabulous Swedish metal wall plaque.

vintage Swedish plaque of a fish in relief made from copper and tin and designed by Sven Lindström

The stylised beaten metal fish just screams 1960s and was designed by Sven Lindstrom. We didn’t get the name of the stall holder so can’t give him a mention in person. He was very friendly and knowledgeable – travelling to Denmark on buying trips. He even gave us a few tips for places to check out… so thanks if you happen to be reading this! We’ll make a journey when we get our camper van sorted!

detail showing the maker's label from a vintage Swedish plaque of a fish in relief made from copper and tin and designed by Sven Lindström

We made our final purchase just as we were leaving – this pin dish was on the stall next to the main entrance.

small white vintage Gustavsberg 'Grazia' pin dish designed by Stig Lindberg

We love the graphic townscape design in simple black on white – it just caught our eye despite being so small.

detail showing the backstamp from a small white vintage Gustavsberg 'Grazia' pin dish designed by Stig Lindberg

It turns out to be the work of Stig Lindberg – a true great of Scandinavian design. That was a bonus!

If you missed the last two shows, the Manchester dates for 2013 have recently been confirmed – 17 March, 9 June & 27 October.