DesignerSwedish
Tord Björklund
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Tord Björklund was born in Sweden in 1939 and trained at the Academy for Interior Architecture in Copenhagen, Denmark, a formative step that brought him into close contact with the functionalist traditions of mid-century Nordic design education. He went on to build a career that moved across furniture, electronics, and industrial products, working for manufacturers in Sweden, Japan, and beyond.
Björklund began designing for IKEA in 1980 and over the following decade produced some of the company's most enduring pieces from that period. The Klinte easy chair, with its tubular steel frame and suspended seat in natural saddle leather, has become the design most commonly associated with his name. Its formal clarity and material directness reflected the Scandinavian approach to functional seating without conceding any of the sculptural intelligence that made the chair stand apart from simpler utilitarian production. The Skye chaise longue followed a similar logic, extending the body rather than containing it, and both pieces circulate actively on the European vintage market today.
The Polhem sofa and armchair, also for IKEA, took a different direction. Lacquered bentwood arms, metal wire leg supports, and removable leather cushions gave the Polhem a structural expressiveness that was frankly postmodern in character, more interested in how the object declared its own construction than in any inherited Scandinavian restraint. The Gotland two-seater, with its solid pine frame and striped fabric, occupied a more vernacular register, drawing on Swedish rural furniture without becoming nostalgic about it.
Outside of furniture, Björklund designed the Sony TC-D5 Pro II portable cassette recorder in 1982, a piece that won international recognition for its precision and ergonomic intelligence. The commission reflected the breadth of his practice: he was an industrial designer in the full sense, not confined to interiors or furnishings. He also taught industrial design at Lund University and was a member of the Association of Swedish Designers, receiving the Excellent Swedish Design Award twice during his career. Tord Björklund died in 2018.
At auction his furniture appears mainly through Malmö and Stockholm-area houses, consistent with his southern Swedish base. Pairs of Klinte armchairs have sold for up to 9,654 SEK and a single Skye lounge chair has reached 4,434 SEK. Demand is steady for the IKEA pieces from the 1980s in good leather condition, with pairs consistently attracting more competitive bidding than single chairs.