Scandinavian interiors’ shop takes over former Mothercare premises on Patrick's Street

A new retail experience with Scandinavian style hits Cork next month, writes Carol O’Callaghan, with novel possibilities for Christmas gifts.

The Vikings are back, but in the nicest possible way, offering a new shopping experience to an Irish audience, without any intention of pillaging our wallets.

The sweet tasting curative for the ever-increasing branches of the same retail outlets filling our shopping centres and main streets is called Søstrene Grene.

And right now, the finishing touches are being made to its new home at 74/75 St. Patrick’s Street, in anticipation of its opening in November, and where it will add some much needed chic to what has become a forlorn and neglected thoroughfare.

The shop layout follows a labyrinth of aisles laden with products and ideas to take home and apply to your own space.

It’s been brought to Ireland by franchisees, American Heather Lawlor and her Irish husband Niall, for whom the brand’s Cork branch will be their fourth.

They’re just in time for Christmas shopping, with the promise of gorgeous products for accessorising our interiors for the festive season, and all year round.

Selling everything from kitchenware, candles, tableware and glassware, to food, tea and even some furniture and craft making supplies, it offers the clean lines of Scandinavian design we’ve come to know from Ikea and the smaller scale, whimsical Tiger, but at the same time offering something different.

If we were to get very precise about it and colour up a Venn diagram, it would not only overlap with Ikea and Tiger, but also with style icon Habitat, although Søstrene Grene’s prices won’t overexert our wallets.

This means we can expect lollipops for 10c and chairs for €40, with much more in between.

Heather and Niall Lawlor of Sostrene Grene.

For shoppers, it also brings novelty in terms of layout, with an interior labyrinth-style construction of high shelves full of stylish homewares.

Even the shop lighting has a theatrical quality, free from the glare of the dreaded, energy draining fluorescent bulb.

It’s all part of the Søstrene Grene retail philosophy which also includes the playing of gentle, slow classical music to facilitate a soothing walk around the shop.

Given that Ireland has only just started to develop an appreciation of Scandinavian design for its combination of utility and attractive aesthetic, for some it’s love at first sight, but for others it’s something which grows on you over time if you haven’t been exposed to it before.

For Heather, it happened when she relocated to Sweden and had her first experience of shopping in a Søstrene Grene branch.

Søstrene Grene’s tablewares include beakers, plates and bowls which are designed along elegantly simple lines, as are carafes and milk jugs.

“I grew up in the US and never understood Scandinavian design,” she confesses.

“It wasn’t until I lived there that I could see how calming the clean lines are, and comfortable, without being bare. I also loved how they use candles as an easy fix for the darkness of winter closing in. I used to buy a hundred tea lights every week like buying milk.”

You’ll certainly find candles aplenty in the shop which is spread over four floors, harking back to the brand’s founding in 1973.

“The very first store was on the first floor of a building,” Heather explains.

“People had to be given a reason to walk upstairs, so it became, in effect, a discount shop.”

The formula seems to have worked as there are now a total of 120 branches in11 countries, and a fifth Irish shop is in the offing.

But success for the brand goes further than that — there’s broad appeal from a product range which has a timeless quality and is not dictated by the whims of fashion but rooted in the solid principles of good design.

Crockery is finished in grey, cream and a fleshy tone which can be mixed and matched while maintaining a neutral look that won’t overwhelm your table top.

The target audience appears to be everyone who likes playing house -— young or old— and those with a mind to browse.

“We want customers to discover things for themselves,” says Heather.

“We get mothers with buggies and a take-away coffee walking around our other shops, but we know from visits to Cork in the past there’s a young, vibrant energy here, and it has so many attractions, so that’s why we wanted to open here.”

But just in case you’re having trouble with the pronunciation of Søstrene Grene, which translates as the Green sisters, after its founders Anna and Clara, don’t worry.

Over time it will probably develop into a uniquely Irish pronunciation, but if you want to give it a go, try ‘sos-tren-ah grain’, with a nice throat clearing emphasis on the letter ‘r’.

Heather Lawlor, owner of Søstrene Grene in Ireland.