Beauty is Key

Maria Veerasamy strikes an intriguing, monochrome figure surrounded by an abundance of printed fabric, wallpaper, and colorful and wooden furniture. I meet her, the CEO of Svenskt Tenn, inside the interior design company’s eclectic headquarters, above its three-story flagship Stockholm store in which various objects are displayed in playful yet intentional tableaux. Her cropped black hair frames her thoughtful eyes. She is dressed in her signature black attire, careful to never overshadow her work.

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As Svenskt Tenn gears up for its centennial this year, Veerasamy is busy preparing for a calendar full of events and launches, including an exhibition and a book, that underscore the enduring legacy of its artful objects that are found in virtually every Swedish home. The brand will celebrate with products from its expansive archive, some never-before-produced, such as the prolific Viennese architect and designer Josef Frank’s Stockholm Cabinet (which is emblazoned with a greyscale, vintage map of Stockholm) and his Carpet nr 20, a playful, abstract assemblage of red, blue, yellow, and green dots. Another piece, the Noah’s Ark Nesting Table, a hand-engraved pewter table top by Nils Fougstedt from 1927, was one of the first furniture designs offered by Svenskt Tenn. “It’s incredible to see this work come to life again, almost a century later,” says the woman who has helped usher the design house into a new era while maintaining a throughline to its past.

Growing up in Småland, Sweden, Veerasamy the granddaughter of a cobbler, discovered her love for craft at an early age. She worked at Sandviks glassworks and later trained as a women’s tailor. After several years at design companies, she took the helm of Svenskt Tenn (which means “Swedish pewter”) in 2011. It was a daunting task for a company with a cult-following that has had only a handful of CEOs since it was founded by Estrid Ericson in 1924. “I listened inwardly,” Veerasamy says. “I created a framework with the strengths that remained from all the previous decades.” She speaks deliberately as she reflects on the brand’s role in Swedish design history, recounting the impact of Frank, Ericson’s close collaborator who designed many of Svenskt Tenn’s signature pieces with a warm take on modernism.

Even in its early days, Svenskt Tenn was conceptually far from the minimalism and clean lines that dominated Scandinavian design. It was—and still is—as Veerasamy emphasizes, “an interior design company with its own expression, where high quality in design, materiality, artisanal production, and choice of partners such as designers, suppliers, and employees strengthen the aesthetic world. It holds magic and uniqueness.” I ask her how she thinks Ericson would feel about her beloved Svenskt Tenn’s development, where archival designs are presented beside contemporary design collaborations. “Hopefully Estrid would have loved them all,” she muses. “She might have told us to be a little bit bolder ... The focus on functionality is great, but beauty is key.’”