The IKEA catalogue through the ages | Hacker News Reader

The IKEA catalogue through the ages

ikeamuseum.com

72 pointspmcpinto62 comments

I definitely think it's a mistake that IKEA stopped printing their catalogues last year. The offline experience is totally different from online. Online I tend to do direct searches for things I already decided I want, but the IKEA catalog is perfect for casual browsing and getting new ideas for stuff I would've never bought otherwise.

It might come off as a cost saving short term, but I doubt in the end the catalogues did not bring in enough money anymore.

I wonder to what extent it's due to considering the environmental impact bad publicity.

probably cost saving, but disguised as CO2 emission reduction

Compared to this though?

"Ikea has for years sold children’s furniture made from wood linked to vast illegal logging in protected Russian forests, an Earthsight investigation has found."

https://www.earthsight.org.uk/news/press-release-illegal-rus...

So IKEA bought lumber certified by FSC, which at least until recently was a well renowned organisation. Apparently FSC shouldn't have certified this particular lumber. "FSC denies wrongdoing, but shortly after being alerted to our findings Bakurov’s certificate was abruptly terminated on 15 Jun 2021."

This might be a scandal with FSC, but hardly with IKEA. I don't expect every company to themselves track every piece of raw material back to the sources. They must be allowed to outsource some of that.

I was not implying anything very factually based, just a decision based on people's perception. Like the ban on plastic straws.

In this day and age, peoples perception is everything, and facts seem to be unimportant.

Facts, like that IKEA used certified lumber so they had very good reasons to believe that they used sustainable resources? Or that this scandal doesn't have anything to do with IKEA, but it seems like everyone that bought wood from that part of the world probably are as big part of it?

They really tried to make it look like it was about IKEA children's furniture!, but if you actual read the article you linked it has actually very little to do with IKEA and there's nothing there that says IKEA did anything reprehensible or even anything that is hard to defend.

Dude, I was agreeing with you.

I linked that article, because I recall it in the news, and it got fairly widely covered at the time with the blame firmly placed at IKEAs feet - "They should have known" apparently.

People believe what they are told these days, without any desire to fact-check or cross-reference. I think this was my point.

Surely cutting down fast growing trees and burying them in landfill is a great way to sequester co2?

Given IKEA essentially produce throwaway furniture by design, I don't think they've got much of a leg to stand on when it comes to environmental responsibility.

Just buying more stuff is literally how they have historically marketed themselves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBqhIVyfsRg

The price point might make people buy more that's true but calling it throwaway is hardly fair, still have a fair amount of 20 year old ikea stuff around the house and they're pretty extreme about quality assurance.

Indeed, IKEA stuff is really well built, solid, and lasts for years. I’ve had so many bad pieces of furniture from other manufacturers, IKEA just lasts, year after year, move after move

The “IKEA is crap” thing seems to be an American trope.

Or they could improve the website to make it easier to get an overview of everything by category and scroll through listings with details with as little clunkiness and ephemeralness as possible

>Production of catalogs like this squeezes our biome, and if we don't turn back, it will pop, and we'll be left with only enough resources for a small fraction of us to survive.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26163808

>, but the IKEA catalog is perfect for casual browsing and getting new ideas for stuff I would've never bought otherwise.

Understand the advantage of serendipity by flipping through pages instead of entering product search queries.

Fyi, the latest 2022 catalogs are available online with the typical "print book" layout and also downloadable as pdf:

https://www.ikea.com/us/en/customer-service/catalogues/

With pdf catalogs, you get the undirected window shopping without killing trees and adding to landfills.

EDIT reply to: >Those PDFs really don't work well on mobile devices.

Sorry for not being clear. The initial UI is not a pdf. They are web browser "digital catalogs" with page layouts similar to a printed book. There's also an option to download to pdf file.

I just tried it on my smartphone and the pages look fine. No pdf download necessary.

Nowadays most people will probably use their phones for this sort of thing. Those PDFs really don't work well on mobile devices.

> without killing trees and adding to landfills.

I wonder what leads to worse pollution. A world where all information is printed and there are are no computers, or a world where no one uses paper and computers, cell phones, Kindles, etc proliferate.

Those are not the options though since personal electronics aren't going anywhere. It's either computers and papers or a similar amount of computers but at least less paper.

I realize that. It's more of a thought experiment.

Paper actually reduces pollution because trees are farmed and replanted in managed forests like crops with decades long seasons.

The more paper we use, the more trees we plant.

Not just IKEA. Argos and CPC both stopped catalogues, and my purchase with them declined. Argos especially had a USP over amazon being the “book of dreams”, something to leaf through in a Sunday morning and go “oooh”

Now I simply buy stuff on Amazon.

It used to be common in Sweden to see stickers by the mail slot that read "No advertisement, please! But gladly the IKEA catalogue." They stopped distributing the printed catalogue long before 2021, but I've kept the sticker.

Do you mind sharing an image of it?

This is the same one I have on my front door: http://buschmeier.org/bh/stockholm/images/20051114_IKEA.jpg

Cool, thanks!

I remember a time when you wanted (some) adds. I had a "No adds but the Cinema timetable and catalogues please" on my mailbox.

I almost miss the paper adds. Somehow they were wildly more relevant ...

Ha, does the postman/postwoman[0] respect the sign? I've got a "nevhazujte letáky" sticker on my mailbox ("no flyers/ads") that is completely ignored. As an immigrant this is particularly grating around election season when my mailbox is stuffed with material from a couple of anti-immigration candidates.

[0] - I just realised that I only use the Scottish gender-neutral slang "postie" and don't know the correct one in standard English :D

I have a friend who is a mail-carrier (which I think is the most accurate gender-neutral term) for Canada Post. She refers to herself often as "postie" as well, and her co-workers as "posties". :]

Ah nice, a quick search revealed it's used in Australia, NZ and Canada too :D

Ye, at the time the Cinema flyer guy actually did read the signs and we got the flyer, but almost no other flyers.

The mailman proper, if I can call them that, did however deliver all stamped mail no matter what. The "no adds"-sign does not work for stamped adds, or like flyers put into the newspaper, etc.

Oh yeah I wouldn't expect the mail carrier to make a judgement call on when I want mail if my name and address was on an envelope. But for the flyers from supermarkets and things that get stuffed into every mailbox should really respect the "no flyers" sticker. Ah well, it's only a minor inconvenience in the end

Boy I wish this was a thing in the US. The amount of junk mail I get is ridiculous.

You could always order it for free from their website.

I always think it is a nice fact that over 70% of all images (maybe even 90% today) in the latest catalogues are 3D renders.

This gives IKEA the ability to change things (plants, wallpapers, and so on) depending on different cultures without having to completely change a studio.

Edit: a YT video from 3 years ago about the workflow: https://youtu.be/bJFlslL1wFI Textures are prepared in Photoshop, models made and textured in 3DsMax, rendered with V-Ray.

It also allows them to erase all women.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/10/02/162139455...

This is from 2012 and was done without IKEA's consent.

How about the prison numbers on the black person's t-shirt from 2021?

https://www.businessinsider.com/ikea-2021-catalog-delayed-im... https://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/ikea-offensive-racial-image-b...

and the "can't be black for the greek market" from 2018?

https://www.thelocal.se/20180206/ikea-agent-tells-actor-he-c...

Point I am trying to make is that IKEA is a slick global company that is not "good" in a moral sense but rather doing what makes them the most money.

I am sorry but I don't get your point. This is something almost all companies do. If you are going to release thousands of catalogues you don't want things in it that could offense people. I think it would have been the same if the t-shirt contained some black-metal logo for example.

For the other example it's the same. I'm from the Netherlands so an IKEA ad with a black man would not surprise me, but for example an Arab man with a turban would. In the advertising world you want to connect with your target audience. I have a hard time believing this has anything to do with racism because their catalogues are full of people from all over the planet.

Anyway, I don't like IKEA products, I think they are rubbish. But I like the fact they use a lot of 3D renders.

These anti-black msgs seem like some shit from IKEA viz team in EU misbehaving. VS photoshopping out women which is the kind of request directed from market research, i.e. in architecture visualization, not uncommon to have racist renderings for marketting (brown people in service spaces) while submitting alternate united colors of benetton versions for awards consideration.

IKEA is a Khronos Group promoter member: https://www.khronos.org/members/list

(note: my employer is a part of the IKEA group)

So many of the designs are timeless classics, but the older pictures make them look dated. It's the look-and-feel of the room, decor, colour balance, lightning, picture quality that make the pieces in the pictures look dated, as if they "belong in the past".

If you place these exact pieces in an otherwise modernly decorated room (colour balance of walls/ceilings/lightning), and photograph with modern style - they instead look classy and timeless.

It's rare that people can isolate which sensory impressions make them react in a certain way emotionally. Here it's clearly not the designs, but the styling/lightning/photos.

The room ins the 80's looks like modern rooms. The decades before looks more alien/old, so it seems like furniture stopped changing much about 40 years ago.

To me it is interesting seeing how progress was fast and then slowed down at different points in different fields. Like, how far back do you have to go before you start noticing that these things aren't new? For webpage design you see how it was really different 20 years ago, but not that different 10 years ago, game graphics mostly peaked 5-10 years ago depending on genre (people still happily buy and play gta5 that is 8 years old without cringing at its graphics) etc.

40 years ago was when teak went out of fashion (possibly out of concern for the rainforest?) and pine went in. But I think it has changed a lot still from that, 80s living rooms still look alien to me even though I'm old enough to remember them.

The IKEA 80s living rooms have some things in common with those I've seen in old films and sitcoms (e.g. Back to the Future), but it's still not quite the same. IKEA 80s catalog images are as it was in Norway though, totally.

I really can't see any notable difference between the 1983 catalogue and the 2013 one. Mostly that the more modern ones has messy rooms with people and stuff in them, but the furniture looks the same.

If you care a lot about furniture fashion maybe it is easier, but to me those are the same.

I can hardly be accused of caring for furniture fashion, but I know that even finding a carpet like that on the 1983 catalog would be hard today, except of course in a used furniture store. Likewise the drapes.

If I wanted to give that 1986 couch to a charity shop, they would probably refuse and say they could never sell it.

Of course there are some more neutral, "timeless" things too. The 1983 cover couch would not stand out at all today, and I believe the little tables are still for sale at IKEA (I have one, though it's in the laundry room)

> but I know that even finding a carpet like that on the 1983 catalog would be hard today

That carpet is literally in the first room of the 2013 catalogue. Or maybe it is a different carpet, but I can't tell the difference.

Wish I could buy the furniture of 40 years ago instead of the stuff they make now.

Edit: maybe not, just had a look at their 1981 catalogue...

For what it is worth,the Pöang is pretty much unchanged except it is dramatically less expensive now.

I am surprised to see that my beloved Poäng armchair (mine has served me well for 20 years now, with a new upholstery every 6 years) is already present on the cover of the 1977 catalogue: https://ikeacatalogues.ikea.com/77436/1102677/pages/4a7b75dd...

The part for sitting seems to have been made out of metal back then, in my version, it is the same plywood material as the frame.

Billy has been around since 1979. Don’t mess with the classics!

I was aware of that, but I would've never guessed that IKEA started selling Poäng before they started selling Billy.

Usually with furniture there are forerunner designers / manufacturers that establish an innovation, then all mass manufacturers copy it a decade or two or five later.

For example the cantilever laminated wood frame chair made an appearance already in the 1930s. https://www.artek.fi/en/products/armchair-401

Cantilever steel tube + cane chair Cesca from 1928. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cesca_Chair

It's interesting to see the price of the Poäng over time:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/roede...

from:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-weird-economics-of-...

I know people here like to criticise Ikea but they are remarkably good at squeezing cost out of their business.

It was a retro-chair already in the 1970s. See here Aalto's Armchair 406 (made and sold by Artek) from 1939.

https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=Armchair+406+aalto&iax=imag...

IKEA catalogues, products and how they're rendered vary regionally, hard to capture it all with just English Catalogues. I have new IKEA products page from China/US/Germany bookmarked to see satisfy my Ikea enthusiasm. Interestly, hometurf Sweden doesn't get a lot of new products.

Why, why did the Kramfors sofa get killed off? It was a $400 sofa that rivaled $3000 sofas from other manufacturers and nothing in the market comes close these days.

> It was a $400 sofa that rivaled $3000 sofas

Sure, in much the same way a £10 tshirt from Uniqlo matches a £90 tshirt from Sunspel. They're not really the same thing.

I don't know from Sunspel, but I paid $4000 for the seating in my living room and I would trade it for a pair of Kamfors right now.

I don't know if it is that way for the rest of the world, but here in Scandinavia those are extremely iconic of what living rooms looked like by decade.

Looks like my house stopped in the 80's :D

Bring them back!

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