vintage arabia and rörstrand

photos: flaska online

: : I have mentioned before that my dad [.pappa. swedish for dad] used to work for Swedish china company Rörstrand [in Lidköping, my hometown] and Finnish china company Arabia

Through prints&patterns I discovered this wonderful Japanese website flaska that sells vintage ceramics, most of it cups and saucers from Scandinavian companies like Arabia, Rörstrand and another Swedish company, Gustavsberg. Most of these cups are from the 40's and 50's, many of which I have seen at friend's grandparents houses and flea markets around Sweden. They're becoming more and more popular and therefore more and more valuable. In the US you can find some of them on e.bay.

I think they are all so lovely! Such bold, happy, colorful patterns! I decided to make it a new hobby, to collect vintage cups. Hopefully, every time I go home to visit, I can locate a few of the beauties in the pic. above and bring them back.

.pappa. actually told me a funny stor about the cups, because I thought it was a bit strange to find all these Scandinavian cups on a Japanese website. He told me that at Japanese weddings the wedding couple doesn't recieve gifts, but they give gifts to their guests instead [as if a wedding wasn't expensive enough already]. Often they like to give two of something, and coffee cups turns out to be the perfect gift. Additionally, the Japanese food culture is so different than Western food culture and they rarely tend to use the same plates that we use, if any plates at all. So, that's why the website is comprised mostly of cups and saucers for sale. Interesting fact I thought. : : enjoy!