Swedish Grace Functionalist Dresser attributed to Axel Larsson for Bodafors, 1930s

Interior architect and furniture designer Axel Larsson was born in 1898 in Medelpad, Sweden. Educated at Högre Konstindustriell Skolan (1916-1920) and mentored under Carl Malmsten during the Stockholm City Hall project (1919-1920), Larsson spent the first half of the 1920s cultivating his design sensibility amid European study trips before being hired by Svenska Möbelfabrikerna Bodafors’ (SMF) in 1925 in Stockholm. A precocious talent, Larsson stature within the company swiftly grew, and within a few short years, he was appointed SMF’s Head Designer—likely in response to Larsson’s tour de force debut on the international design stage at the 1930 Stockholm Exhibition. There, representing Bodafors, Larsson presented an array of functionalist-inspired furnishings, both strikingly simple and timeless, including a particularly well-received dark birch chair with braided hemp webbing.

While overshadowed by the slightly flashier work of contemporaries like Malmsten, Josef Frank, and Bruno Mathsson, Larsson continued a consistent and influential output into the midcentury. His post-1930 portfolio at Bodafors was particularly notable for interior design commissions for the Gothenburg Concert Hall and the Folksamhuset in Stockholm, along with the approximately 500 furniture lines he designed for mass-production. These collections—which included high-quality and refined cabinets, credenzas, chairs, other casegoods, all crafted from trademark Scandinavian blonde woods—essentially revolutionized how the Nordic region mass-manufactured furniture, introducing new methods and standards.

After over thirty years with the company, Larsson left Bodafors in 1956 to start his own firm but continued to collaborate with his former employer throughout the coda stages of his career. This twilight span saw Larsson work with a number of Sweden-based firms, including the Swedish Handicraft Association and Balzar Beskow AB, which continues to produce Larsson’s stackable S-312 Chair today.

He passed away in 1975. 

Known by a variety of names—the AB Bodafors Chair and Furniture Factory, AB Svenska Möbelfabrikerna i Bodafors, Svenska Möbelfabriken AB, to name a few—Bodafors was one of Sweden’s earliest incubators for the application and subsequent renown of Scandinavian functionalism in furniture design. At one point, with over 400 employees, it was the largest furniture manufacturer in the Nordic region. The name is drawn from the town where the company is located, in the Småland region of Sweden.

Founded in 1918 via merger of small-scale Swedish manufacturers—chiefly, the Bodafors-based factories of brothers John Albert (1859-1913) and Frans Oskar Zeinwoldt (1860-1924) along with Värnamo Möbelfabrik and Carl Fredriksson's Träförädlings AB in Katrineholm—Bodafors established its main production in its namesake town, a particularly strategic location for furniture manufacturing that offered immediate access to railways, forests, and hydroelectric power.

From this factory, alongside one smaller facility in an existing space at Värnamo, Bodafors quickly cultivated a highbrow prestige countrywide, producing (mostly) series of practical furniture for an upper class Swedish minority. The company was awarded a Gold Medal at the landmark Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes held in Paris in 1925 and, later, by extensive representation at the paradigm-shifting Stockholm Exhibition in 1930, which opened the world’s eyes to the Scandinavian approach to modernist architectural and interior design.

From the 1930s onward—rather in contrast to comparable Swedish furniture manufacturer Nordiska Kompaniet—Bodafors began modifying its design focus toward the expanding Swedish middle class. The 1950s and ’60s proved to be a particularly prolific era for this kind of production: Practical, well-made, competitively priced seating, tables, and casegoods—many of which were crafted in woods of teak, mahogany, and oak—became hallmarks of the Bodafors catalogue at this time.

Personnel-wise, Swedish interiors and furniture designer Axel Larsson (1898-1975) lays claim to much of Bodafors’ design innovations and industry imprints across the company’s lifespan. His tenure as the company’s head designer, from 1925 to 1956, was notable for the role he played in pioneering mass production processes, as well as for design commissions such as the Gothenburg Concert Hall. Bodafors also culled much of its stature from outside collaborations with Swedish functionalist modernist design heavyweights. Carl-Axel Acking, Bertil Fridhagen, Carl Malmsten, Bruno Mathsson, Josef Frank, Axel Einar Hjorth—all produced for Bodafors in the midcentury, with many involved (e.g., Malmsten, Einar Hjorth) at the very beginning of their expansive, influential careers.

Beyond practical goods for private homes and clients, Bodafors also manufactured furniture and furnishings for commercial offices, cinemas, schools, restaurants, hospitals, and ships. The company remained a heavy player in the Swedish design game until its dissolution in 1971, when it was absorbed into the Mälmo-based DUX furniture group.