Thomas Bernstrand can boast of being both a renowned Swedish
designer and a singular rebel on the Swedish design scene. When Thomas
presented the two lamps Do Swing and Sugar Ray at his exam exhibition
at Konstfack, the School of Arts, Crafts and Design in Stockholm, they
were immediately picked up by Droog Design which featured them in their
much-praised show during the Milano fair in 2001. A lamp which allowed
you to fly over the bar counter and another in silicon to punch until it lit up.
‘I need to justify what I create’, says Thomas earnestly. ‘Why make a new
product? Can I do it differently? In a more environmentally sound way?
Allow for more efficient logistics? Make it easier to move? It can almost be
anything as long as the product offers something new, otherwise it doesn’t
count.’
The same desire to challenge prevailing norms with witty and meticulously
conceived design is mirrored in Thomas’ art project. The Beach, which
won the 2008 Siena Landscape Award, consists of sun deck furniture and
parasols in a year-round installation in the centre of Stockholm. Movable
Space is one of four projects still to be completed; a slowly revolving light
installation that will adorn the new commuter rail station Odenplan in
Stockholm. Thomas’ education spans industrial design to art, and he studied
in Stockholm at both Konstfack – the University of Arts, Crafts and Design –
and Konsthögskolan – the University of Fine Arts – as well as at Denmark’s
Designskole. His work can be found in museums both in Sweden and
Denmark, and of course in the Blå Station collection. Thomas has also
been awarded many design prizes, among them the Young & Design
Award, Italy, and the Imm Interior Innovations Award, Cologne, Germany.
FAVOURITE PODCAST?
Lilla Drevet, where the cartoonist
and radio host Liv Strömqvist
succeeds in joking about themes
often deemed to be too sensitive
for humour.
THINGS THAT STIMULATE YOU?
I like opposites. Public art
installations are a way of finding
new uses of spaces, but they can
also make me very angry at the
bureaucracy that must be surmount-
ed in order to have your ideas
come true. After that it’s always
quite a relief to turn back to the
challenges of industrial design and
solving lots of petty details.
THE LAST BOOK YOU READ?
Gut: The Inside Story of Our
Body’s Most Underrated Organ,
by Giulia Enders. Isn’t it absurd that
we fill ourselves with antibiotics,
which kill our bacteria, both good
and bad, and then we have to
rebuild our immune system over
and over again?
THOMAS
Thomas Bernstrand
HONKEN | Thomas Bernstrand + Lindau & Borselius 2015
