Tuesday, October 28, 2008

From the Globe and Mail--Swedish Lutheran Style minimalism

"With credit harder to obtain, mortgage costs rising and unemployment growing in the United States, Europe and Japan, clever advertising may not be enough to persuade those who can still afford it to part with their money.

"In grim times it becomes distasteful or simply unfashionable to spend money on bling or what you might call conspicuous consumption," said Rory Sutherland, vice-chairman at advertising agency Ogilvy.

"There will be a trend toward Swedish, Lutheran-style minimalism," Sutherland predicted, referring to the modest, even austere, lifestyles favored by Lutherans and Swedes by reputation."

Or did they just mean to say IKEA?

2 comments:

Bror Erickson said...

"There will be a trend toward Swedish, Lutheran-style minimalism,"
As a Swede, and a Lutheran, I know what he is talking about, yet I feel I should be offended. Maybe though I am not. Of course, I quite enjoy the simple elegance of Swedish style which he calls minimalism. Problem is when it comes to things like Orrefors you pay much more for this simple elegance than you do for gaudy cut glass the English seem to prefer.
Though pietism certainly cut the fun out of being a Scandinavian, and made it quite unfashionable to show any delight in the daily bread we receive from God. That is the point of "Babbettes Feast", to show the hypocrisy of all that. Of course we received that from Geneva via Strassbourg and Spener.

Brigitte said...

Funny, that they would actually use the word "Lutheran". Nobody ever talks about "Lutheran".

I think what they really mean, we will all be shopping either at Walmart or IKEA.

I am still on my 1980's IKEA furniture, loving everything pine. With the current downturn, We will be keeping it, and our grandchildren will be allowed to demolish it and when we die they can burn it all. No heirlooms.

Our daily bread, I think we have enjoyed plenty and plenty-fully over the years, pietism, or not.

Especially cake. We have always had such nice baking, coffee time, good sausage...

What we were not allowed to do was take dancing lessons, when everyone else took dancing lessons. And we were not allowed to dress up for carnival, when everyone else did. That was stupid.