Why does everything have weird names? Every container, shelf, cabinet or appliance had some odd name, as if people from Planet Sweden anthropomorphized these objects, naming each one they encountered as best they could: Besta, Hedda, Bjarnum, Lerberg, Inreda, Ektorp, Grundton, Berta, Karna…
According to Wikipedia, it turns out IKEA follows a certain naming convention based on Scandinavian words:
Upholstered furniture, coffee tables, rattan furniture, bookshelves, media storage, doorknobs: Swedish placenames
Beds, wardrobes, hall furniture: Norwegian place names
Dining tables and chairs: Finnish place names
Bookcase ranges: Occupations
Bathroom articles: Scandinavian lakes, rivers and bays
Kitchens: grammatical terms, sometimes also other names
Chairs, desks: men’s names
Materials, curtains: women’s names
Garden furniture: Swedish islands
Carpets: Danish place names
Lighting: terms from music, chemistry, meteorology, measures, weights, seasons, months, days, boats, nautical terms
Bedlinen, bed covers, pillows/cushions: flowers, plants, precious stones; words related to sleep, comfort, and cuddling
Children’s items: mammals, birds, adjectives
Curtain accessories: mathematical and geometrical terms
Kitchen utensils: foreign words, spices, herbs, fish, mushrooms, fruits or berries, functional descriptions
Boxes, wall decoration, pictures and frames, clocks: colloquial expressions, also Swedish placenames
Continue reading about IKEA’s naming convention on wikipedia
Thats very intresting thing that u brought up Boo
I used to wonder about these strange names my self.
you’re welcome Filza 🙂
I guess some of the names are only strange to us because we are not Scandinavian.
Very interesting read. Thanks.
I always thought those were the swedish words for the things they are selling hahha
Me too!!
I’ve learned something today
THANKS BOO!