30th August 2017

Zetteler Films: Swedish Design Moves

“The design you make is a product of the society that you live and have grown up in,” says Malmö-based designer Ingrid Wingård. “When we grew up we were surrounded by Sweden in the 80s. So it was white packages with blue text on it. Our parents were driving Saabs.”

Minus tio, founded by Ingrid together with her husband Olle, is one of six design practices to feature in a series of short films created by Zetteler Films for Swedish Design Moves. The series spotlights six of the 11 practices exhibiting as part of the Swedish Design Pavilion at London Design Fair this September, and captures the raw human emotions, beliefs and inspiration driving each practice.

Minus tio

Providing a stage for some of the boldest and most innovative design companies from Sweden’s Skåne region, Swedish Design Moves is part of a wider four-year initiative (set up by the Swedish government and spearheaded by Visit Sweden) to celebrate, and frankly shout about, Sweden’s creativity and innovation within architecture, design and fashion. The showcase is diverse and will span furniture, lighting, print design and interior objects.

Swedish Design Moves commissioned Zetteler Films (more on that below) to travel to Malmö and create a series of films to document some of the people and practices behind the exhibition. Over the course of five days, we ventured from city streets to rural forests, met some seriously fascinating people, and created six short designer films that each offering an insight into southern Sweden’s vibrant creative scene. The whole experience was hugely enjoyable and with both Zetteler Films’ directors self-proclaimed suckers for all things Nordic, it was a perfect project.

Still from the Stoft Studio film

“Hang on a minute, Zetteler make films?” For the last four years, Zetteler founder Sabine Zetteler and documentary director Andy Dunn have been making short films together as Zetteler & Dunn. In early 2017 they decided on a very slight change of tack and rebranded as Zetteler Films. But what does a Zetteler film look like? “Visually, I’d say they are photographic with a naturalistic approach,” says Andy. “They aren’t flashy but at the same time they don’t look too homespun. We don’t go for artificial filters and effects. Instead, we use the best of the natural light and subtly supplement that where necessary."

“In more general terms, the films reflect our own curiosity – the conversations we have on camera generate better stories than fixed questions and answers, and the footage we gather also has that inquisitive, appreciating feel. So the films reflect the personality of their subjects rather than us imposing our style on them.”

The Swedish Design Moves films are just that.

Enough from us, the very point of the films is that they need little introduction. Best bet is to just watch them…

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, Trailer

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, MKID

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, Minus tio

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, Andréason & Leibel

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, Swedish Ninja

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, Butler/Lindgård

Swedish Design Moves, Southern Sweden Creatives, Stoft Studio

To discover more about Zetteler's in-house film unit, Zetteler Films, contact hello@zetteler.co.uk or watch our showreel here.