During our last visit to Copenhagen, Denmark we had the pleasure to finally visit one of our favourite homes in the world. The home of iconic Danish furniture designer and architect Finn Juhl. The house has been profiled and photographed so many times, it already felt incredibly familiar to us, as if we know every detail in the house.  Of course seeing the home in person is like switching on a light, something inside of us just gets turned on and during that visit we understood how important Finn Juhl as a designer, architect and artist was. You start to see all of the incredible nuances that you might not notice in photographs. For example in different rooms the ceilings are painted different colours, like a warm beige in the living room and a cool teal in the guest bedroom.

I think the interesting thing about Finn Juhl’s house is that he designed it when he was quite young, and as a work of architecture it is functional and simple. I think when people see images of his home we are struck by the Vilhelm Lundstrom painting of his wife above the Poet sofa, the soft patination on the cognac leather of his Chieftains chair, the Vibeke Klint runner, the Japanese textiles and African stools. It is his personal details that we are struck with, his masterful way of bringing warmth and texture into his home. The building itself is a perfect shell to be inhabited with many smaller rooms,  various seating arrangements and compositions of art mostly by his friends and various collections.

Red bricks marking the entrance to the home, with a stool by Alvar Aalto peeking at us. Visitors are also immediately introduced to Juhl’s study in colour.

One of Finn Juhl’s most famous lounge chairs, the 45 chair.

Fireplace detail.

Finn Juhl was on a mission to design everything in his home, including the porcelain service in the kitchen.

The Silver markings on this table indicate the placement for dishes and cutlery.

“One cannot create happiness with beautiful objects, but one can spoil quite a lot of happiness with bad ones.”

– Finn Juhl

The Reading chair sitting next to a wood sculpture by Erik Thommesen.

A Japanese duvet and pillow rest on Finn Juhl’s bed.

In my opinion Finn Juhl’s most beautiful dining chair, the 109 chair which was designed in 1946.

“It is so obvious that furniture should be used. If not, I have been seriously wrong. To me, it is so obvious that it also needs an artistic dimension, which makes it exciting and in harmony with its surroundings. However, furniture was not created only to be looked at. Furniture is an applied art, which is necessary for people in a home, and office of public spaces.”

– Finn Juhl

The Poet sofa was originally designed for Finn Juhl’s own home in 1941, and it looks perfect underneath the Lundstrom painting of Finn Juhl’s wife Hanne Wilhelm.

Great shapes.

There was a great Matisse show at the Ordrupgaard Museum (which owns the Finn Juhl house).

A coffee break and walk through the sculpture garden.

Zaha Hadid extension.

We dropped by the Muuto headquarters to have lunch at their lovely rooftop patio, complete with nice planted flowers, herbs, and vegetables. We’d like to get something like this going on our back roof.

Grabbed dinner at Almanak in The Standard.

Lunch at Øl & Brød