IKEA the Book Brown: Designers, Products and Other Stuff - Tapa blanda

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.

"Not for the rich but for the smart" - a perfect motto for IKEA, the company that has spent half a century democratizing good design. This monumental, lavishly illustrated book - almost 500 full-color pages as full of beauty, bright ideas and cool surprises as a visit to IKEA itself - is the first complete presentation ever of the phenomenon that is the world's most successful furniture enterprise. It's an incredible resource for anyone interested in contemporary design and consumer culture.

From Swedish publisher Arvinius, this book tells IKEA's story from its origins as a mail-order company. It details breakthroughs like the invention of the hex wrench and the flat pack, which let the cutting-edge retail giant serve almost 600 million customers in 25 countries in 2009. Chapters showcase the hit parade of the most popular pieces over the decades (the Billy bookshelf has sold millions), and interviews with some of the chain's top designers reveal their surprising passion for the store and its visionary founder, Ingvar Kamprad.

This first-edition book itself is destined to be a collector's edition: impeccably printed in Europe, it is published with three different cover colors (pink, green and brown, each with its own ISBN). After a year or so, IKEA will offer its own mass-produced version in a smaller trim size and lower print quality. Like the vintage IKEA catalogs now selling on eBay, get this while you can.