Sámi Heritage and IKEA Fusion: Maria Vinka’s Denationalized Design, Neocolonial Craft and Material Imaginaries Somewhere in Between

• Main Author: Ezra Shales
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Gothenburg 2020-06-01
• Series: Parse Journal
• Subjects: maria vinka; ikea; sámi; design history; commodification; scandinavian art and design; swedish design; commercial appropriation
• Online Access: https://parsejournal.com/article/sami-heritage-and-ikea-fusion/

The designer Maria Vinka has a long and distinguished record of working for IKEA, but her identity is usually subsumed in the corporation’s larger brand. Investigating IKEA artifacts as cultural predicaments, this article questions the Swedishness of IKEA’s global commodities and the social intentions of Vinka’s work for the company. Vinka’s Sámi heritage has been a resource for her contributions to the immense multi-national home furnishing chain store. But her work also transcends the typical boundaries of cultural identities and what we recognize as Sámi, or Swedish. Documenting this individual designer’s oeuvre, this article seeks to record one designer’s voice and intentions and contextualize them within a larger framework of design history, especially in relation to gender and cultural agency.