IKEA the book, Designers, products and other stuff

Along with Volvo and ABBA, IKEA is Sweden's most internationally successful brand. In recent years, furniture pieces from IKEA have occationally turned up at international design auctions. These inexpensive, owner-assembled, everyday products have become collectors' items. Meanwhile, the designers behind the furniture at IKEA have long been unknown to most of us. IKEA the book brings them into new light to describe the creative and successful, celebrated world of scandinavian design. What ideals are IKEA's designs based on? What makes the KLIPPAN sofa and the BILLY book case as sought after in Basel and New York as in Stockholm? How did Ingvar Kamprad get world-famous designers like Verner Panton and Hella Jongerius to create original pieces for mass production in IKEA's factories?

IKEA the book is more than a walk through the fantastic history of The Great Furniture Factory; it holds something for everyone interested in design processes and stylistic ideals.

Staffan Bengtsson is a television producer specializing in design and architecture. He has written a dozen books and produced 500 television shows. In the summer of 2009 he curated the first ever comprehensive IKEA exhibition at the Liljevalchs art gallery in Stockholm.