Frozen Light
Tapio Wirkkala Photographed in 1959
Kaj Franck Photographed in 1940
Timo Sarpaneva portraying the "Orkidea (Orchid)-vase" in 1954
Ingeborg Lundin Photographed in 1963
Erik Höglund (Right) with Erik Rosén, Director of the Boda Glassworks in 1950
Nanny Still Photographed in 1965
Per Lütken
Modernism in Glass: The Scandinavian Approach
There is a quality to Nordic light that defies imitation. In winter, it hangs low in the sky, filtering through snow-laden trees and shimmering across frozen lakes. It softens edges, deepens shadows, and brings a quiet stillness to the landscape. In the mid-twentieth century, Scandinavian glassmakers found a way to contain that light, not with brush or camera, but with glass. Using breath, heat, and remarkable precision, they shaped molten silica into forms that felt both elemental and poetic.
From the 1940s to the 1970s, a glassmaking renaissance swept across Sweden, Finland, and Denmark. Sweden’s postwar stability gave it an early lead, with glassworks such as Orrefors and Kosta cultivating a culture of design. Yet the creative force flowed across borders. Artists including Tapio Wirkkala, Timo Sarpaneva, Ingeborg Lundin, and Per Lütken helped establish a new vocabulary for glass, one that was elegant, sculptural, and emotionally resonant.
Though many of these designers worked across materials, it was through glass that their visions crystallised. These were not merely functional objects, but contemplative forms shaped to capture atmosphere and feeling. In a world increasingly defined by the disposable, Scandinavian glass remains grounded in presence and depth, made to be lived with rather than simply observed.
What distinguishes this glass from other traditions is not only its craftsmanship but its philosophy. Where Venetian glass might revel in opulence and Bohemian crystal in dazzling cutwork, Scandinavian design pursues clarity, restraint, and emotional subtlety. Forms are clean and modest, surfaces often left undecorated to allow light to play freely, and colour, when used, is thoughtful rather than flamboyant. The inspiration is drawn not from excess but from the Nordic landscape itself; textures echo ice and bark, shapes follow the contours of wind and water. Even the most vibrant pieces seem grounded by this quiet reverence for nature, resulting in objects that do not clamour for attention but slowly reveal themselves over time.
The Masters
As the Scandinavian glass movement gathered momentum in the mid-twentieth century, it became clear that this was no single aesthetic but a constellation of voices, each with its own approach to form, material, and meaning. At the heart of this creative surge were artists who redefined what glass could express, pushing the medium far beyond functionality and into the realm of sculpture, philosophy, and cultural identity.
Tapio Wirkkala was perhaps the most visceral of these innovators. Rooted deeply in the Finnish landscape, he brought nature into the glassworks with a kind of quiet conviction. By blowing molten glass into wooden molds, he preserved the texture of bark and grain in the final forms. His pieces were elemental, their surfaces recalling ice, tree trunks, and bone, objects that felt as though they had emerged directly from the earth rather than the furnace.
Kaj Franck, also working in Finland, approached glass from a different direction. He believed in clarity of thought and honesty in design. While Wirkkala explored texture, Franck refined form to its most essential geometry. His work for Iittala epitomised the idea that utility and elegance were not mutually exclusive, and his commitment to accessible beauty laid the groundwork for what is now seen as the DNA of Finnish modernism.
Where Wirkkala and Franck offered restraint, Timo Sarpaneva brought drama. A master technician as well as a visionary, Sarpaneva played with thickness, opacity, and surface in ways that lent his pieces a sculptural grandeur. His work at Iittala often involved sand casting, a method that produced deeply textured, almost geological forms. There was always a tension in his glass, between solidity and fragility, light and shadow, that gave his vessels a commanding presence.
In Sweden, Ingeborg Lundin brought a distinctly lyrical sensibility to the material. Her Apple vase, created for Orrefors, remains one of the most iconic objects of the era: delicate, transparent, and filled with a sense of contained motion. Her forms were often deceptively simple, but always imbued with softness and poetry, capturing emotion without embellishment.
Erik Höglund, working at Boda, saw glass as something far less pristine. He embraced its imperfections, using them to express raw, human stories. Bubbles, tool marks, and embedded figures became part of his vocabulary, and his work often referenced Swedish folk traditions. His glass was tactile, symbolic, and grounded, glass that told stories rather than simply refracting light.
In Finland, Nanny Still introduced a bold new colour palette to the Scandinavian aesthetic. At Riihimäki, she created vibrant, modernist designs that stood out for their graphic clarity and sense of play. Her work spanned many materials, but in glass, her use of colour and form felt particularly fresh, confident and joyfully experimental.
Meanwhile in Denmark, Per Lütken was redefining the weight and movement of glass at Holmegaard. His forms were fluid yet substantial, often blown with a thickness that gave them both softness and strength. There was a sensual quality to his vessels, an invitation to hold, to use, to feel their weight in the hand, that exemplified the Danish approach to design: human, balanced, and beautifully considered.
Together, these artists did not just advance a craft. They authored a language, each phrase shaped by their hands, each sentence spoken in light and form. Their legacy continues not only in museums and collections, but in the quiet presence of their pieces, still glowing on shelves and windowsills, quietly anchoring the spaces they inhabit.
Alchemy and Process
At the heart of Scandinavian glass is the relationship between idea and execution, between designer and maker. Most pieces were crafted through a collaborative process, whether blown, cast, pressed, or mold-formed. Unlike fully industrial production, these methods retained the mark of the human hand.
While mouth-blown glass was common, particularly in Sweden and Denmark, many of the most iconic Finnish works were made using wood molds, sand casting, or pressed glass techniques. These approaches allowed for texture, repetition, and expression beyond what traditional blowing alone could offer.
At Orrefors, Graal and Ariel techniques layered coloured and clear glass with engraved designs. These were then reheated and encased to create dreamlike imagery, motifs floating inside thick crystal. In contrast, artists such as Wirkkala and Sarpaneva used casting to imprint the very textures of nature into their pieces, while Nanny Still explored vivid cased colour combinations that danced in shifting light.
Each work reflected an invisible choreography. The designer envisioned a form, and the glassblower interpreted it with breath, movement, and timing. It was a craft shaped by seconds and intuition, where material and maker met in fluid motion.
What makes these objects endure is not only their form, but the process that gave birth to them. They are shaped by fire and held by memory, works of art, yes, but also quiet testaments to care, skill, and innovation.
Ephemeral, Eternal
Glass is a curious material. It is fragile, transparent, and easily overlooked, yet when shaped with intention, it becomes one of the most enduring forms of expression. Scandinavian glass, in particular, carries this quiet strength. It captures not only the essence of design, but something more elusive, the atmosphere of its time, the care of its makers, the philosophy of a region.
For years, collecting glass was often associated with older generations. Many viewed it as something inherited rather than chosen, a relic of mid-century homes or a forgotten shelf of dusty ornaments. But that perception is beginning to shift. A new appreciation is emerging, especially among those who value authenticity and individuality over mass production. These objects are no longer seen as static or sentimental, but as deeply personal pieces that bring texture and presence into the spaces we inhabit.
Interior designers, too, are returning to materials that carry meaning. Instead of filling a room with anonymous, decorative objects, many are choosing to place a single piece of hand-blown glass where it can be noticed and felt. Scandinavian glass fits this moment beautifully. Its forms are honest, its colours considered, and its weight often surprisingly reassuring. These are not items created to meet a trend. They are works conceived to endure, visually restrained, emotionally resonant, and inherently human.
Collectors may be drawn to the iconic names; Wirkkala, Franck, Sarpaneva, Lundin but the appeal goes beyond provenance. It lies in the quiet brilliance of the pieces themselves. Even without a signature, a well-made object speaks. It reveals its quality in balance, in the way it catches light, in the silence it holds.
To collect Scandinavian glass is to reject the disposable. It is to choose clarity over clutter, and meaning over mimicry. It is not about filling a space, but about giving it something to reflect, something that will last.
A Lasting Impression
To hold a piece of Scandinavian glass is to hold more than an object. It is to hold a breath, a gesture, a pause in time made permanent. These works were born not only of material, but of philosophy, of a belief in the power of simplicity, and in the beauty of things made to last.
As homes move away from the impersonal and return to the meaningful, these pieces feel more relevant than ever. They invite us to slow down, to look closer, and to choose not just what fills a room, but what gives it soul.
In collecting them, we collect more than design. We collect intention, memory, and the rare clarity of something that doesn’t age, but deepens.
