Design Stories room 3

Designhistories spans an entire floor and presents Nordic design from the late 19th century to the present. Through applied arts, fashion, and product design, visitors encounter objects that tell stories about their time, their creation, and their use. The exhibition brings together well-known design icons alongside more unexpected objects from the museum’s collections. The name Designhistories refers to the many layers of stories contained within each object: from the idea and production, through use, to reuse and new contexts. The exhibition is organised thematically rather than strictly chronologically, with six themes highlighting design from different perspectives. The thematic approach makes it possible to create new connections between well-known and lesser-known objects and to show that design history is not always linear. Instead, ideas, materials, and expressions reappear over time in new forms. In this way, the exhibition opens up new ways of understanding both our present and our future through the museum’s collections.