Meet Our Designer

I love colour and design. They are my passions. I draw so much inspiration from nature and from my work. My work is not just a job for me; it’s my life. I am also lucky enough to be able to meet our customers and users. The people who use my things provide me with loads of inspiration. I meet a lot of people at fairs and these days are always intense and fun. I am driven by curiosity, by asking myself how this particular colour combination will look. I spend a lot of time conjuring up combinations in my head, mostly when I am surrounded by the mess in my room at the office. I will be rummaging through our gloves and wool socks and all of a sudden I will get a picture in my head of how they can be changed; how the pattern can fit somewhere else. This is an ongoing process that I always carry with me. Once ideas for patterns take shape I start off by creating a sketch and after that I put it into boxes on paper.

 

The digital part comes later, almost at the end when the design has been set. At that point there is a lot of feeling and consideration involved - Should it stay? Be removed? Changed? - in my world of colour. At this stage in the process I am like in my own little bubble. Then once I rework the pattern into another design, e.g. a sock, it takes on more of a sketch form.

I love my job. The variations, feeling and starting the process, drawing, following up, changing, digitalizing, the first prototype, correcting, then in production, delivering to the shops, attending fairs, meeting with customers; everything about the work. I constantly carry around so many ideas in different stages, ideas that take up a lot of my time.

 I love seeing our patterns on people I meet. It is such a huge source of pride and joy for me to see my patterns on people. The patterns take on a whole new life; a larger life, a truly tangible life. They see the light of day on my drawing table and then they begin to take on lives of their own. It is a truly magical feeling that is hard to describe. Sometimes I need to pinch myself because it feels so big and unreal that people are wearing my patterns. It’s really happening and I feel so incredibly blessed and grateful. To me, a pattern is a not a random thing but something cohesive. Creating patterns that have a long lifespan is what I believe is my most important contribution to a better, greener world. This is my passion.

/ Åse Öjbro