Pieces of teak, glass and pottery

This weekend has been one of the really great ones. The weather has been sunny and warm, allowing us to have all meals out on the terrace. I love that. I didn't think I'd be doing much thrifting, but I squeezed in a small stop on my way home from work on friday, and a small trip late this afternoon. I found some stuff that I don't usually find, which was very exciting. At the local salvation Army store on friday, I found another Ultima Thule tumbler (for information, look here). I collect them, and really hope they keep turning up.

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There was also another Kosta Boda snowball votive holder, designed by Ann Wärff in 1973. I found two last week, so there's now a trio.

More glass, I found three small smoky grey Hadeland Fersken (peach) dishes, an award winning design by Willy Johansson in 1956. I guess they were originally designed as individual butter dishes, but I can also imagine they'll be great for soy or ponzu sauce for sushi.

I found this Figgjo Market piece designed by Turi Gramstad Oliver. Market is a rare find over here. A quick search on the web reveals where they all are... (rather large continent to the west:-) I have this one and a lidded serving dish. Unfortuneately, the lid was repaired with glue after having been broken, as is often the case with these. The lids are heavy and fall off very easily. I guess it will get a new life as a small planter in my kitchen in the company of two siblings, Folklore and August. You gotta love those quirky market scenes with all the glorious detail! The butter boxes were designed for what used to be the exact shape of a package of 500 grams of margarine here in Norway. That was later changed into a more rectangular shape, and consequently, Figgjo started making the lower rectangular butter boxes, like my Folklore one below (More Folklore here and here). 

 

 

 
Also, waiting for me when I came home on friday, was a package containing a four ring Festivo for my new collection, a bargain on Etsy. I now have three!!

Saturday was spent in the garden, doing a little bit of grooming. Today, my husband left early for New York, the kids were off with friends and I felt like a bit of thrifting:-) For a long time I've been curious about a lady who regularly has ads on Finn (the norwegian equivalent to Craigslist). She lives a 40 minute drive away from me, and I decided it was time to pay her a visit. She sells all kinds of retro pieces, and has an impressive glass collection. She has a room she calls the "retro room", which is covered in teak shelving full of treasures. She uses what she earns from her sales to restore her beautiful art nouveau house from 1906, and who wouldn't want to sponsor such a noble deed? I hope she doesn't mind me publishing a photo. Her current project is to restore the windows. I have to admit, the house itself was half the purpose of my trip. I love art nouveau, both my own home town and my mother's (Ålesund) has a lot of it, and I think I really fell in love when I lived in Brussels at the age of 15- 16 and visited Victor Horta's house. For you foreign guys, this is what our wooden art nouveau houses looks like. Isn't it beautiful?

I could have bought pretty much everything she had on display, but I really needed to restrain myself. A few goodies came along, though, and I will definitely be going back! The first things I fell for are these wonderful salt and pepper shakers and the salad servers and spoon in steel and teak. I'm not sure who designed the salt and pepper set, but they're most probably danish. They're large and heavy, and I will give them a light sanding and coat of oil to bring out that beautiful lustre. The salad servers and spoon are so incredibly elegant. I've seen them before on the web and have been hoping to find them one day. I know for sure they're norwegian, and I think they're designed by Thor Bjørklund who invented and patented the typical norwegian cheese slicer in 1925. I'll have to see if I can find out some more.

Next pieces I found are two Hadeland Multe bowls, also in one of my favorite glass colors, smoky grey. The Multe (cloudberry) series was designed by Willy Johansson in 1966, and was awarded "Merket for god design". I'm not sure how to translate that, but it's an award where both form and functionality is taken into consideration, given by the norwegian design counsil. They're so beautiful and simple, and I've been looking for one of these to fit the "upper deck" of my Digsmed lazy susan. It has small bowls in the same color and room for a bigger bowl on the upper level. I don't think there was one originally. 

The sweet lady had an impressive glass collection. It was hard to decide what to pick out, but what I couldn't leave behind were these modernist owls by norwegian artist Benny Motzfeldt (1909- 95). She was an amazing glass artist with a large and varied production. Aren't they gorgeous? They're not large, but very heavy, and will work as paper weights or just great sculptures.

The next piece I got was such a thrill to find. I've never seen Kronjyden Relief in thrift stores over here, so this is my first piece, a candle holder, hopefully there will be another one to join it. I love the color and the pattern, and totally agree with Birgitte, over at The Little Black House, that it resembles a danish (or norwegian for that sake) cornfield rather than something assosialted with leaves. "Relief" was designed by Jens H. Quistgaard in 1959-60.

After leaving the beautiful art nouveau home of the sweet icelandic lady, I made a quick stop at an antiques barn. They mainly have older pieces, but look what I found! A Figgjo Tor Viking lidded serving dish! It reminds me so much of growing up, we used to have this at home.Apart from this piece, I now have four small plates, two egg cups and a creamer and sugar bowl that was my mom and dad's.

 

A few new ones

There hasn't been much time for thrifting lately, May is by far the busiest month of the year, both at home and at work. I have managed just a few small ones that I thought I'd share.
A little while ago, I found this beige and brown vase by Bay West Germany. Right after, I found this red one with the exact same shape at a local flea market.

 

Did you know Stavangerflint didn't just make souvenir cups and plates, there were even souvenir skillets? I didn't, until I got the latest addition to my Stavanger souvenir collection when my mom and dad visited for constitution day. And yes, I now have three and hereby declare it a collection:-)

Most of these were designed by Anne Lofthus, I guess that's also the case with the skillet. The motifs are from around town. On the handle is a statue of a boy feeding some ducks, which stands outside my old high school, which again, is next to the cathedral where I got married, showed to the right. This shows the gothic facade facing east, while on the plate I've shown in a previous post, the roman facade to the west is depicted.

In the bottom are the famous ducks that made the police stop the traffic to help them travel safely from the harbour to the city pond. The story made the front page of several newspapers, I think it was in the fifties or sixties.

 

Mom and dad also gave me this lovely Figgjo Bekkeblom (in latin: Caltha palustris) sugarbowl, designed in 79 by Rolf Frøyland,  they had found in an op shop. Sadly, the lid is missing, but I'll be on the lookout for one. I don't usually go for flower patterns, but this one is too beautiful to resist. What I especially like is the shapes of the stems, the lines have an art nouveau feel, I wonder if that was intentional? I've seen it very clearly on the plates in that pattern, where the stems frame the plate in a beautiful way. I also love that the flower is a very "humble" one, they're often the most lovely! It's found locally and has caught the eye of the artist. 

That same flower also inspired another artist to make a series for Egersund fayence some years earlier. Kitty Kielland (female landscape painter from Stavanger, sister of famous Norwegian author Alexander Kielland) designed their Bekkeblom pattern in 1901. 

 

The final pieces today are two Kosta Boda snowball candle holders, designed by Ann Wärff in 1973. They're not at all hard to find in thrift stores over here, and they're still in production, just like the finnish classics featured in my two previous posts. The votives sit deep into the center of the snowball and lets the textured glass break the light in all directions making the whole thing glow from inside. It's a very beautiful sight on a dark scandinavian fall or winter night...

I'm feeling rather good about myself, having also lightly sanded and oiled all the surfaces of my new teak kitchen this weekend. The new wood surfaces recieved one coat of oil before assembly, and the treatment should be repeated a few times. i was a bit worried that the oil would streak and go on unevenly, but the oil I got from the manufacturer was very lightweight and fluid, and a joy to work with. The surfaces look amazing now, the extra coat of oil did a lot of good. That's all for now, I wish you a great week:-)