Founded in 1935 by Alvar and Aino Aalto with Maire Gullichsen to sell furniture and 'propaganda for modernism', Artek still makes Stool 60 and the Aalto canon. Its Helsinki flagship at Keskuskatu 1 B occupies an Eliel Saarinen-designed building; the two-level shop carries the full Artek collection, including Stool 60 and the Domus Chair, alongside home textiles, carpets, books and a stool-customization workshop.
Best for Aalto furniture from the source; Stool 60, Domus Chair, home textiles and stool customization
Artek was founded in Helsinki in 1935 by Alvar and Aino Aalto, Maire Gullichsen and Nils-Gustav Hahl. The four idealists wrote a manifesto that set out to sell furniture and to promote a modern culture of living through exhibitions and education. Aino Aalto served as the first Design Director and from 1941 as Managing Director. She led the interior design division called the Drawing Office. Gullichsen, a painter trained in Paris and Helsinki, brought exhibitions of Picasso, Leger and Calder to Finland and founded the Artek Gallery in 1950. Hahl, an art historian, was the first Managing Director until his death at the front in 1941. The furniture rests on Alvar Aalto's L-leg, developed with manufacturer Otto Korhonen in the late 1920s. That bent solid wood leg made more than fifty products possible. The Helsinki store at Keskuskatu 1 B opened in March 2016 in a building designed by Eliel Saarinen and completed in 1921, opposite the Stockmann department store. Two floors of about 700 square metres hold the Artek collection alongside Vitra and other Finnish and international brands. Interior design services are offered, and a workshop customises Stool 60 on site. Artek marked its 90th anniversary in 2025 with a summer exhibition at the store and an Artek + Moomin collection engraved with Tove Jansson's drawings.
Espartería San José has traded from Calle Jáudenes 3 in Granada since Antonio Rosales Yañez opened it in 1907 to sell tools to farm people from the surrounding villages. The fifth generation of the family now runs it. It buys from small local artisans working esparto grass and wicker, along with anea rush and wood. Shelves hold olive wood mortars and esparto lamps. Wicker trunks stand beside palmito stools and coils of hemp cordage.
Best for Esparto baskets, olive-wood mortars and wicker from Granada artisans
Antonio Rosales Yañez opened the Espartería San José in 1907 to sell tools for the countryside. Farm people from the villages around Granada came to Calle Jáudenes, as did carriers from the Valle de Lecrin and the Alpujarra and workers from the cortijos of the province. They bought tool handles and halters. Sickles hung beside sieves. Salt stones sat with cowbells, and packsaddles were sold alongside rush-seated chairs. Two artisans worked on the premises in those years. Vargas worked leather and packsaddlery, and Garrote, a picador by trade, made saddlery whose kind has now all but vanished from the fields. The shop says it has come through a civil war and deep economic crises without leaving Calle Jáudenes or the premises it has always occupied. The fifth generation of the family now runs it. It continues to buy from small artisans of the Granada area who still work esparto grass and wicker, along with anea rush and wood. The shop frames that trade as support for local craft and for the local economy. The stock has widened from farm gear to household goods. Olive wood mortars and salad bowls share the shelves with boards and cutlery. Esparto lamps and mirrors hang beside planters and rugs, and esparto blinds are cut to order. Wicker trunks and picnic baskets sit next to palmito stools and children's chairs. The address is Calle Jáudenes 3, and the shop also sells through its own website.
Fabriken sells vintage furniture, lighting and interior design pieces from 1900 onward in Gothenburg, Sweden. Current stock includes a bar stool by Aalto, folding chairs by M. Koch and a serving cart by H. Bolling, at the shop on Ekedalsgatan 16.
Best for Vintage furniture, lighting and designer home pieces
King Street antiques dealer trading in 18th- and 19th-century English and Continental furniture, silver, and china since 1922 under four generations of the Birlant family. It is the maker of the cast-iron-and-cypress Charleston Battery Bench, reproduced from the originals along the harbor promenade.
Best for Antiques and the Charleston Battery Bench
Hida Sangyo makes wooden furniture in the Takayama region, continuing a business that began with bentwood production in 1920. Its work includes designs that use the character of timber rather than hiding every knot or variation. The company's Takayama store displays furniture and offers consultation on repairs and reupholstery, connecting a purchase with the later life of the piece.
Best for Wooden furniture and repair advice in Takayama
Hida Sangyo's furniture grows out of a woodworking business established in the Takayama region in 1920. Its beginnings involved bentwood production using beech, and the company still places the relationship between timber and technique at the centre of its work. The material's character is part of the design vocabulary, including furniture that makes use of knots and Japanese cedar. This gives visitors something specific to examine beyond a general claim of traditional craftsmanship.
The company's Takayama store presents its furniture in person, alongside other corporate stores elsewhere in Japan. Its published services include consultation about repairs and reupholstery, which is useful when thinking about how a piece will be used over time. That is an invitation to discuss an item, not a guarantee that every repair can be undertaken. HIDA describes its furniture as made in Japan and its craftspeople as working in Hida Takayama. The origin of the finished furniture should still be distinguished from the source of every timber species. A visit can focus on construction and the way different woods appear in the finished designs.
Poltrona Frau has made leather furniture in Tolentino, Marche since 1912, using its own Pelle Frau saddle-grade leather. The house is known for the Chester sofa and a century of leather upholstery made at that same Italian workshop.
Vienna lighting workshop founded by Wolfgang Karolinsky, reissuing Wiener Werkstatte-era designs (1903-1932) by Josef Hoffmann, Koloman Moser, Adolf Loos and Otto Wagner from original tools and copyrights; showroom at Singerstrasse 16.
Best for Luminaires based on Wiener Werkstätte and Art Nouveau designs
Woka Lamps Vienna is a Vienna lighting workshop built around the reproduction of designs from the Wiener Werkstatte, the Viennese collective of architects and designers active from 1903 to 1932. Founder Wolfgang Karolinsky developed an interest in the movement while studying at Vienna's University of Music and Performing Arts; in the 1970s he began an active trade in original pieces, and went on to acquire copyrights and original manufacturing tools dating to around 1900, which became the foundation of the Woka workshop. The company now produces table, ceiling, wall and floor lamps and chandeliers based on historic designs by Hoffmann, Koloman Moser, Adolf Loos, Otto Wagner and Carl Witzmann, alongside its own contemporary pieces.
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