Our spring and summer tablescapes are sorted. Pick a Poppy has just revealed its collaboration with acclaimed Swedish artist Madelen Möllard, who brings her dreamy floral paintings to a range of porcelain tableware and textiles, inspired by cherished childhood memories. Below, all you need to know about the collaboration
Some of our fondest memories are often forged from moments spent gathered around a table with our loved ones, whether it’s a birthday celebration, a holiday feast, or a simple coffee break.
The last is what inspired Swedish interior brand Pick a Poppy’s latest collaboration with celebrated Swedish artist and Vogue Scandinavia alum Madelen Möllard, an endeavour deeply personal for the creative. Housing hand-painted ceramics and textiles, the collection, dubbed Memory Garden, draws from Möllard’s treasured childhood memories of enjoying fikas (or coffee breaks) at her grandparents’ place, where the table was always set with blue-flowered porcelain, a time she now looks back on filled with nostalgia and warmth.
Photo: Pick a Poppy
Swedish artist Madelen Möllard. Photo: Pick a Poppy
“I remember the feeling of being absolutely safe and taken care of and listening to my grandparents’ stories. The careful way the table was set. The quiet confidence in my grandmother’s baking,” Möllard reminisces. “It was very calm and entertaining. I think it’s that sense of ease I hope to create for others – along with the conversations and stories people might share with one another around the table.”
Featuring plates, serving dishes, tablecloths and napkins, the tableware became a canvas for Möllard’s memories, delicately adorned with vibrant flowers and dainty patterns. Flora has been an enduring muse for Möllard in her work. “For me, flowers carry and preserve memories,” she says. “There is also something very human about them as they bloom and fade, and to me, they also have personalities. They can be cute, aggressive, kind, edgy…”
Photo: Pick a Poppy
Photo: Pick a Poppy
Pansies, particularly, hold a special meaning for the artist, whose grandfather, also a painter, often used them as a motif in his work. As an homage, the blossom emerges central to the collection, dancing on crisp white tablecloths and stretching across porcelain plates. “Porcelain has a permanence to it, and there was something very beautiful about putting fragile memories onto such a lasting material,” Möllard muses. “It felt like preserving memories and almost like setting the table with them.”
Möllard describes collaborating with the Pick a Poppy team as a “very natural” process. “From the beginning, there was a lot of trust, which allowed me to stay close to the original feeling of what I wanted to create,” she says. “That trust is essential when working with something personal.” Möllard began by poring over old photographs and recalling the tablescapes at her grandparents’ home, while also reflecting on the elements she associates with spring and summer. Another bloom sprouted in her mind. “Every year, hundreds of tulips grow by our summer house, and that image stayed with me,” she says. Working with a mix of flowers, layering them, Möllard gradually removed “what felt too decorative.” “It was important to create motifs that can live naturally in both porcelain and textile,” she adds.
Related: 20+ beautiful new vases for spring
Photo: Pick a Poppy
Photo: Pick a Poppy
Photo: Pick a Poppy
Malin Glemme, co-creative director and founder of Pick a Poppy, couldn’t think of a better collaborator for the brand. “Highlighting talented artists whose aesthetics are so full of personality feels both fun, important and a natural extension of the brand. Madelen’s colourful design aesthetic reflects the soul of our brand – creative, vibrant and full of character,” she says.
As for how Möllard herself would set the perfect Memory Garden table? “I would want it to feel warm and not too styled. Tablecloth and a mix of plates of food meant to be shared or filled with cookies. A slightly messy and beautiful bouquet of flowers on the table,” she says. “I’d like to create a table where people don’t feel rushed and where conversations continue long after dinner or coffee is finished.”
The Madelen Möllard x Pick a Poppy collaboration will be available to purchase from March 12 at pickapoppy.com