Discovering Copenhagen: small museums, flower shops and gourmet delights
A madeleine with pink icing and Stenbiderrogn, the local caviar. For jewellery designer Sophie Bille Brahe, the city is to be discovered in the nuances of the painter Hammershøi and the verses of Inger Christensen.
by Lisa Corva
4' min read
4' min read
Copenhagen for me is its light: grey blue. The blue of the water, of the harbour, of the sea: although my showroom is in the city centre, I live next to the beach. All these elements inspire me and have also inspired the piece of jewellery I have designed and wear all the time, the Grand Ensemble Ocean Ring, a wave of diamonds sloping from large to small, the line where the sea and the sky meet and merge. Like the twilight, the moment when day gives way to night. Or that instant when you are about to fall asleep: a mysterious, elusive passage.
The grey blue of Copenhagen is also what I find in the paintings of my favourite Danish painter, Vilhelm Hammershoi, to be discovered at The David Collection museum, which also houses a large collection of Islamic art. If I had to recommend a book to understand the city, I would say a volume with Hammershøi's paintings, silent interiors from the late 19th century. And a small collection of poems by Inger Christensen, a woman who came close to the Nobel Prize several times: The Valley of Butterflies (in Italy published by Donzelli, ndr). Every time I reread it, it moves me to tears.
Loading...
Another museum not to be missed in the city is the one dedicated to Thorvaldsen, the neoclassical sculptor who lived in Italy for a long time, and who was very close to my family, often a guest in our castles: one of our ancestors was a well-known 16th-century astronomer, Tycho Brahe. Now the castles are gone, little is left of the family's precious things, and the sculpted portraits of our ancestors are in the museum. But at home there is still an ancient Chinese cabinet made of dozens of drawers: I was allowed to open one every Sunday, together with my father, and take out what was inside. An incredible Wunderkammer.
One day I found a diamond ring that no one knew was still there. I grew up with a love for Thorvaldsen's statues and chose two of his lions for my newly opened showroom on Madison Avenue in New York. I wanted to recreate what for me is an interior of the North: I juxtaposed his sculptures with design pieces I grew up with, like Poul Henningsen's PH Lamps . To America I brought my Letter collection, rings and necklaces with the letters of the alphabet. I started with the S of my name, finished in diamonds. All the initials are in my handwriting, I love writing by hand and I remember when the mother of one of my first friends told me: you will be really great when you have found your signature, your way of writing your name. That's what I try to teach my children too.
Another thing I love about Copenhagen are the flower shops, especially Tage Andersen's, a true artist. In my atelier there are fresh bouquets every week and that's why I designed some Murano vases. I have been on the Venetian island for a long time, experimenting with master glassmakers. I like the pearly, opalescent light we got for vases and candle holders.
Loading...
