Page 93 - Homes & Antiques (February 2020)
P. 93
DESIGN ICON String Shelving
LEFT The String System first flourished from the mid 1950s
to the 1970s. ABOVE Kajsa Strinning was said to be
‘thorough, artistic and patient’. Nils Strinning worked with
Kajsa over several years to refine the design to a thing of
beauty and functionality. BELOW A vintage Bonnier poster
advertising original String shelving.
THE STRINNINGS
Husband and wife Nils and Three months before his
Kajsa Strinning were both death, Nils a!ended the
architects in Stockholm. ‘He’d 2006 Stockholm Furniture
designed chairs and sailboats, Fair to see String’s return,
but had no hits before String ‘very pleased to see it taking
shelves,’ explains Peter o"’. Kajsa died in 2017.
Erlandsson. ‘He was the The system is as in#uential
engineer, she the artist – the as ever, and Peter has
perfect combination. Nils commissioned celebrated
wanted to design chairs, but Swedish designers – Anna von
they never really sold. I met Schewen, Björn Dahlström,
them many times. She was Mats Theselius – to produce
very humble, he still some new work in String’s
very energetic.’ iconic house style.
Stock Photo; John S Timeline The evolution of shelving
Friend/Alamy
Jason
Images;
Getty
via Lander/LightRocket via Getty Images; Fred Dufour/AFP via Getty Images
Leemage/Corbis 3rd century BC This aumbry has held Revolving bookcase The Strinnings’ The extraordinary
1949
1722
2017
685
Up to 400,000 scrolls
terraced shelves of
encasing sacred
Caudery; lined the shelves of the vessels and vestments in Buddhist scriptures in blueprints for the system Tianjin Binhai Library,
that would open up a
St Paul’s Church, near
research hub of the
Dave ancient world, the great Jarrow, for more than Naritasan Shinshoji whole new world of China, were designed to
hold 1.2m books.
Temple, Japan.
1,300 years.
Library of Alexandria.
shelving design.
February 2020 Homes & Antiques 93
