Björn Nilsson

The Evolution of a Wallpaper Designer

My grandmother Elsa has played a major role in my interest in art. She was my creative mentor when I was a child, and with her, anything was possible. She taught me that there are no limits to what you can do artistically. Elsa worked as a seamstress in Borås until she met my grandfather.

I grew up in the 1960s, when Swedish design and pattern design were all the rage. Many interesting designers and patterns emerged during that time, and even then I knew that design was something I wanted to do.

If I look back in my memory to my youth, my strongest memory of a pattern is a series by Sven Fristedt. This series may be one of the reasons why I draw my own patterns today.