Country Style for the City

For the past ten years, Gård & Torp has been showing readers how to keep up houses and farms out in the countryside, but home improvement is about much more than just traditional Swedish red paint and wattle and daub. That’s why the magazine has come out with a special one-shot issue full of inspiration and information for citydwellers and suburbanites: Bevara stilen i stan (preserving style in the city).

“We noticed an increased interest among young people in maintaining and recreating period details, and the number of home improvement and construction stores has risen exponentially in recent years,” says Gunilla von Platen, editor-in-chief. “Home improvement for an apartment is different than for a house in the countryside. In the city, it’s more about space and preserving or recreating period details, rather than what materials to use and how to use them. City houses are renovated more often and many original details have been replaced over the years.”

The new one-shot is for those who want to renovate their apartments without ruining the original floorplans or details.

“You can read about balconies from different time periods, the well-planned housing of Sweden’s big Million Program from the ’60s and ’70s, an impressive grand apartment with gilded leather wallpaper, courtyard gardens, an 18th century house saved from destruction and an art deco kitchen that was extended to double its original size,” says von Platen. “Plus there are plenty of book and shopping tips, and inspiration!”