DOT ODDITY

To see my Circus pattern produced by Uniqlo for their fall -19 collection is a thrill to say the least. It has been hard keeping it a secret for so long but now when it hit the shelves online and in selected stores, I can finally share the good news!… Read more

This year started with discoveries of the huge trade shows for design in Paris. I had decided to visit the two most interesting ones in January, Maison et Objet and Playtime Paris. The first one a huge fair for mostly the interior and lifestyle design market and the second for… Read more

  ISABELLE ARSENAULT FINALLY, I got my hands on this book that I wanted for so long, by Amy Novesky and one of my favourite illustrators, Isabelle Arsenault, ABOUT another artist I admire hugely – Louise Bourgeois! Great combination to make me love everything about it! Each of these artists… Read more

KAFFE FASSETT     To describe the influence of this man and the central place he holds in British textile and design history wouldn’t be possible in a single blog post as this one… It’s not an exaggeration to claim that he started a revolution in the world of handicraft… Read more

  As you might have noticed there has been a lot of activity going on here in January! Page by page we have redesigned the website to reflect the aesthetics and ideals that influenced Dot Oddity in 2016 and will be more pronounced in 2017. It has been an intense process and planning period, but somehow… Read more

Half way into the first month of the year already!!! Time is flying and I really have to get serious about my resolutions… Still, January is a month when I try not to stress too much and enjoy the extended New Year period, tuning in with my inner voice to… Read more

This is a pattern loved by generations of Swedes since it was released by Rörstrand in the 50’s! I have so many memories seeing Mon Amie (My Friend) on countless tables of family and friends from my childhood until this day. It’s a reference for everything related to outstanding pattern… Read more

Dot Oddity 1 year today! To be very precise, this is the day where Dot Oddity’s domain name was registered, one year ago. That was such a special day for me. I had been searching names for my dream project for about ten months (at least!), knowing that it had to be a… Read more

MELISSA CASTRILLÓN   First Friday of the month and time for a new favourite artist in my series “Beauty will save the world”! Meet Melissa Castrillón! Encountering her work first time was a serious WOW! experience… I was completely speechless and amazed by the exquisite skills and the imagination of… Read more

  the idea of fame… The perception of what makes a person a “real” artist is connected with the myth of the “lonely genius”, which emerged when craftsmen first strove to become respected members of an elite. At the dawn of renaissance the concept of the individual began to emerge in Western Europe… Read more

Luckily, there are many strong role models for Swedish female designers and artists. Here are four women that completely changed the road map of Swedish textile design! I encountered their names early on in my art education as their influence on what we consider typically “Swedish” is groundbreaking. Back then,… Read more

LOTTA KÜHLHORN The artist Lotta Kühlhorn could almost be featured under next week’s subject, pattern pioneers, as well… Since her début in the ’80s, she has worked her consistent colourful retro style into the very hearts of the Swedish people and now holds the place as the Queen of graphic… Read more

rebellious design for an equal world Talking about pattern pioneers this post just had to be written! I couldn’t possibly miss introducing one of the most iconic brands of the Swedish ’70s – MAH-JONG! I love to share this because Mah-jong is not well known abroad although it belongs to the classics of Swedish fashion and… Read more

don’t let your ideas get confiscated One of the greatest obstacles when we want to create something is the transition from the idea we have in our mind into a visible and tangible object outside our head… Somewhere in between, most thoughts get caught in the customs asked if they have anything… Read more

  In 1933 the 48 year old architect and designer Josef Frank (1885-1967) fled to Stockholm from Vienna in the dawn of the growing National Socialism. He was of Jewish ancestry and as so many others feared to remain in his native country. Given his wife was born in Finland but raised in Stockholm,… Read more

  Two things were rather obvious when I was a child – my passions for drawing and for writing. Looking back one could have thought that this kid would become an illustrator or a writer – in both cases you didn’t have to move too much (I was not the sporty… Read more

To create – a painting, a piece of music, a novel; to make art in short – is often more about overcoming obstacles than anything else. From the moment your idea is born you are the guardian sweeping the way for this idea to make its way into the world.… Read more

  There are few patterns in Scandinavian design history as iconic as the famous stem of green leaves by the Swedish designer Stig Lindberg (1916-1982). As one of the most influential post-war designers in Sweden he worked with ceramic, glass, tableware, textile prints and more during his long and successful career with… Read more

LUCILE PRACHE Valentine’s Day is getting close so I thought this image would suit this Friday post! This illustrated recipe showed up by chance on a Google search when browsing pictures of delicious cakes a couple of years ago (I was translating food recipes for a food database at the time and needed to compare… Read more

Since I’ve started this blog and tried to be more present with my work in the online community, using social media and connecting with others, I’m kind of swept of my feet by all the gorgeousness I see every day, the beautiful things people post and share, the creativity that is… Read more

When our neighbours in Finland take pride in one of the most famous design houses of the world – Marimekko (previous post HERE) – we love our own take on this type of bold, colourful, graphic textile design in Sweden: 10-gruppen, known as Ten Swedish Designers abroad. They were founded in 1970 by… Read more

In high school I had an exceptional teacher in art class. She was an eccentric woman in her late middle age with her long hair tied in a bun and floating wide dresses, always black in my recollection. The odd thing is that I remember the name of my professors in… Read more

Many artists settle down in Berlin because life is quite affordable here compared to many other capitals of Europe. Leaving my full time work in Stockholm to pursue my dream of a creative life, where I could develop my ideas of design and illustration, I found myself in this amazing city with its… Read more

Art? Craft? What’s the difference? My professor of design in art school used to say, somewhat jokingly, that a teapot is a craft object until you put a cork in the spout – then it suddenly becomes a piece of art… I always found that very interesting. There are so… Read more

LARISSA BERTONASCO A couple of years ago, I happened to see an illustrated cook book, on the shelf of a close friend in Berlin, that immediately blew my mind! I love cook books, that’s a fact. But this encounter gave me a whole new perspective on illustration and the fantastic opportunity the… Read more

  The path of the artist is always a path of uncertainty and doubt. It is never clearly visible in front of you, you always have to guess a little and trust that the next step will bring you closer to your goal. You can’t follow the footsteps of somebody else, because… Read more

  Beauty will save the world. Those are the words of Fyodor Dostoyevsky from one of my favourite novels of all times, “The Idiot” from 1869. The protagonist, Prince Myshkin, who makes this claim in the novel, is a portrait of a “completely beautiful human being” as the author himself… Read more

This will totally go against the ruling opinion, but something urges me to voice myself for those of us who do our most creative work in the pyjamas! And I mean literally in the pyjamas, or any other outfit you feel most comfy in, as opposed to dressing up to meet the… Read more

I love behind-the-scenes, be it the extraordinary writing habits of my favourite author, which brand of ink my favourite illustrator uses or, of course, the making-of my favourite movies. We are all fascinated by the process that leads up to the finished result. And why is that? I think there are… Read more

What do you love? What makes you want to play? Take a minute to think about that. Maybe ask yourself what makes you stop and watch something as for the very first time? When do you see the colours more vivid, notice the details crisper, and being more mindful about the… Read more

I am happy and thrilled beyond everything I expected to announce the opening of this website and to write this very first blogpost! You, yes, YOU! are an important part of this creative adventure, because as much as I do this due to my love for drawing, making patterns, photographing, handlettering and writing,… Read more