We’ve always been firm proponents of the mantra that your home should reflect your style, and the interconnectedness of the two, so we the least bit surprised that Evelina Kravaev-Söderberg started her career as a fashion designer at H&M before making a move into interiors, where she currently resides as the head of H&M Home. “I started my career at H&M in the late ‘80s as a fashion designer and later as head of design after studying fashion design for five years, three of which we in Paris at Esmod Design School,” she tells me. “Here, no career path is staked out in advance. Instead, you have the opportunity to grow and choose different directions depending on your individual strengths. Being truly creative,” she continues, “is a way of living and I’ve always been passionate and curious creatively across the board.”
Today, her mission is to show us all just how easy (and inexpensive) it is update our homes and have fun with interiors. Day to day, she has her hand in everything from general trends and colours to product, graphic design all of the creative visuals her team produce each season. And don’t be fooled. While H&M is known for fast fashion, the Home collection is all about an evolution, with each building on the last. “We work really hard to create long last trends that also feel of the moment,” she explains. “One of our missions is that our customers should be able to update their homes with a hint of newness and be able to find matching pieces to the already existing items they own.”
Based at the H&M HQ in Stockholm, Evelina’s own house is the perfect embodiment of true Scandi style: think, thoughtfully, restrained palette with the cool, cozy trinkets, wooden 60s vintage furniture, art leant against walls and a series of different sized bottles and jars proudly on display. Naturally, her interiors are equal parts high and low with Grand Prix Chairs designed by Arne Jacobsen, for example, flanking a white lacquer covered with linen napkins and candleholders all from H&M. In the first of our home tours, Evelina breaks down everything you need to know about decorating a home from scratch and how she started when it came to styling hers. Enjoy…
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ON HER HOME
Home is everything to me. It’s not just my work; it’s my life. It is where I spend time with my family and friends, where I get to be myself and to be calm. I love a home where you can breathe and feel the weight of your shoulders get lifted. Airy places make me relax and feel good. Home to me is a place for so many different things. It is a sanctuary, and at the same time it is a place for celebration and sharing. I love creating pieces for the home during the day, and then coming back to my own space to unwind and enjoy living. My style is very serene, mostly using shades of black, white or grey. But although it’s a place of calm, it is not too perfect or organized. I love a home to feel lived-in, so that you can sense people’s characters and that they enjoy their life in the space. This comes from mixing vintage pieces with new designs, contrasting textures together in cushions and throws, and by having personal objects and art on display. I think style is something that evolves over time, and it gives me so much pleasure to find a space where I can express myself, and the things that I love.
We’ve been in the apartment for 17 years now. I live there with my husband and two children, so the apartment is full of memories for me, and excitement about the times we’re yet to share. I truly love the space. The high ceilings, the original details and old wooden floors were among the things that drew my attention in the first place. We have kept a lot of the original details, like the wood floors in the living room and hallway. The ceiling with its stuccos is the same as when the apartment was built. The same goes for the open fireplace, the radiators, the windows and the doors. All those features are also what we found so attractive when we first found the place. All that we needed to do was redecorate. The walls were coloured, very irregular colours like yellow and turquoise. It was not so nice, so we painted the whole place. But the wood floors are amazing and original, and the plan is pretty much the same. We’ve expanded the bathroom, because the adjoining bedroom was so huge and the bathroom so small, and we’ve also made a bit of a bigger opening between the dining room and the living area. But otherwise it’s beautiful, with its old cupboards and the original doors, and we like to keep it that way.
I loved decorating our kitchen. We bought our table from a vintage store, but put the marble top on ourselves. The tableware is a mix of vintage and H&M Home, like the vintage silver cutlery. I like things that are not too perfect so love vintage because it has a history and the imperfections that I like. I never polish old silver cutlery because I love it when it gets a bit dark. It’s great to mix vintage with pieces from H&M, like the linen napkins, the candleholder and the breadbasket. I love to use H&M Home to refresh my style and to add character to the mix.
We love to entertain at home, so it was really important to create a dining room space that felt welcoming and also full of interest. At the heart of the room is the table, which we’ve surrounded with pairs of old café chairs that we found in vintage stores in Stockholm. I like how they have their own character, even before there are people sitting on them. The dining room is a great place for both art and books, because it makes the room feel lively with ideas and creativity. The lounge is the centrepiece of the house, the place that I come to really relax. It’s at the heart of the apartment, with a big wide opening to the dining room, and gives a really airy feeling to the space. The light is amazing, and we’re the only apartment in the building to have a round window, which gives the apartment an extra decorative element that we love. We chose the sofa because we wanted something unusual, and we really liked this design with different modules you can put together. It’s by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia, and it’s called Tufty-Time. On it are cushions from H&M Home, as well as the blanket. It’s great to mix together different textures, especially the chunky knits from our Home collection.
When it comes to decorating from scratch, taking inspiration from the style and history of the building is one of the most important things to consider. If you take the original design idea in consideration it will be easier to decorate, even if you are looking to modernize and update the style. The original design idea will help you keep a red thread throughout the interior decorating process. They key thing with decorating is to take your time. Feel the space, live in it for a while and then decide what furniture you want to fill it with. All you need from the start is actually a bed and a dining table. It’s nice to find a home that you can treat as a blank canvas. Only fill your home with things you truly love, objects that mean something to you and that make you happy.
Lighting is another thing worth thinking about. It’s super important because it’s what creates the mood and atmosphere in a room. It’s generally quite difficult to achieve the perfect light. Sometimes the design of a lamp is beautiful but the light doesn´t correspond. It is exciting because there is so much happening in lighting/lamp design at the moment. Built-in storage is another element you should consider. They’re fantastic. I love our old cupboards that go all the way to the ceiling. I also love that our apartment has built in wardrobes to store all our clothing. So the trick is to invest in built-in storage that goes well with the style of the apartment. I fill mine lot of nice boxes with labels on them.
Above all, my advice is to always stay true to yourself and your taste. Find out what makes you happy and go for that! Get inspired from magazines and the design world but try to bring your unique personality to your interiors. I don’t have much clutter around. I have a lot of things like books, art and beautiful objects, but it’s not over decorated. My tip for injecting newness into your home every so often is to buy new cushion covers and nicely scented candles: cushion covers because they can really change the look of a room and the candles because they are decoratively beautiful and have a nice smell and create good ambiance to any room. It doesn’t have to be expensive to decorate, whether it be making your living area cozy, dressing the table, making your bed or filling the bathroom with personality, and H&M Home offers you the chance to do so with style. That’s what I love.
