Handcrafted plates crafted from wood derived from Swedish forests so you can have a picnic beside the water. A simple lamp to read a book under the moonlight. A brilliant inflatable helmet in case you decide to take a bike ride. These are among the objects that designers Johan and Nina Kauppi have packed in a backpack for you to take on your next visit to Sweden. “We’ve selected products that are great examples of Swedish design, but that we think will also enhance a visitor’s experience of our country,” Nina Kauppi explains.
The Kauppis are among the designers tapped by the Swedish Tourism Board on a new project called the Swedish Design Museum To Go. Designers from four regions in the country—the north, south, east, and west—have curated objects and itineraries that will go in a backpack. Visitors to the country can reserve a backpack for free, pick it up at a designated location, and use it for a week before returning it to be cleaned and repacked for the next visitor. Each backpack also has a couple of items that you can keep as a souvenir of your trip. In the backpack that Kauppis packed for the south, for example, you can bring home a set of playfully designed crayons in funny shapes, like a nose and a pebble. “We wanted visitors to feel inspired to draw or sketch while they were on a trip, instead of just using cameras,” Nina says.
Stockholm, the nation’s capital, is located in the east. Helin Honung and Dimen Abdulla curated that area’s backpack, which includes a list of their favorite galleries and gardens in the city. They also recommend going to Hellasgården, where there is a lake perfect for swimming in the summer and ice skating in the winter. They’ve put blankets in their backpack, along with a battery-powered speaker—the perfect companions for a picnic. There’s also a toiletry kit packed with locally produced lotions for using after an outdoor adventure.
Each object in the backpacks comes with a little description of the Swedish designer or company that created it. And unlike seeing these objects in a traditional museum, the visitor is able to experience the functionality of the design in person. In the Kauppis’ backpack, for instance, there is a Streck cup of fine bone china made by Signe Persson-Melin, a Malmö-based designer who has been working for more than six decades. The cup has delicate stripes on it that are not just attractive but also make for a better grip. “A lot of design these days is tech-focused,” Nina Kauppi says. “But we wanted to highlight that great design can also be low-tech, but enhance your life through its beauty and usefulness.”