14/2025: IKEA, again.

Image © Jose 2025

I had the help of my daughter today as I assembled an IKEA closet system, she reminded me the last time we did this together I had stated I’d never assemble another IKEA piece of furniture, and when we bought this house, I said I wouldn’t want IKEA stuff in there. Yet again, here we are.

You’ve probably heard that IKEA started in Sweden as a mail-order business, hence the flat packs. I believe I went to IKEA for the first time in 1997, at that time in Portugal we still didn’t have IKEA which started operating only in 2004. At that time I had my first Design start-up and I remember we rented a couple of vans, a bunch of us, and drove to Alcorcón, near Madrid to fill the vans with stuff we had only seen in catalogues and online. This was a 7 hour trip there, for a 4 hour shopping spree, and then another 7 hours back. You might call it crazy, but I remember we were the happiest of people, designers and other afficionados, and this is when the love affair started. The year of 1998 was very special for Portugal and the Portuguese, there was a vibrance and a positive outlook about the future, we were preparing for the Expo’98 and Design/ Art/ Culture in all its forms was at the center.

Since then, and every time I moved, at least, there has been a trip to IKEA. The last time I counted, and since I left Beira, Mozambique, with my parents in the back of a Vauxhall Victor in 1975, I believe I have moved more than 25 times, at least 15 times after that first trip to Madrid. Crazy, right? Not the moving part (though I understand some of you might think otherwise), but the idea that a company/ brand has been with me for the last 28 years (more if we count the time we spent dreaming about going to IKEA), has been a part of my growth, has kept up with my needs, and still manages to get me to assemble furniture after all these years.

You might say you don’t want to buy IKEA, and there are things I would not buy from IKEA. But then you come to your senses, and you look at the materials, and the warranties, and the cost, and you end up buying IKEA. And they have tried to solve the problem of people saying NO MORE to assembling furniture, in the US they bought Task Rabbit in 2017 and you can pay people who will do that for you. If you buy a kitchen, like we did, they have full-time employees that will assemble in place your kitchen, and even if you buy specialty counter tops, they have companies that are specialized doing this with/ for IKEA, we used a firm that has been doing this with IKEA for 25 years. If you look in detail to their products, you can see they were designed to the core, you have become accustomed to the fact that their instructions are very simple to follow and, from a design perspective, their type of instructions started a movement that has been copied, sometimes badly, by everyone. And we have become accustomed to the fact that there is never a missing screw, or an extra one for that matter. The closet system we bought and we assembled today was simple to install, still took 3 hours. It was sturdy, up to a point. It looks good, if you are good with a modern seemingly sturdier than it looks type of solution. For the closet? Fine. But it is also a good solution for the kitchen. And the bathroom vanities. And the staircase lighting. After looking for products all over the internet, products you can’t see/ touch/ feel, dealing with waiting times of 6 to 12 weeks, with prices that are many times over the top or simple outside our budget, certain things we end up buying IKEA.

In this house we found many furniture pieces that look like they have been around more than 50 years, we kept them, and we are taking care of them, so they have an extended life. We also have invested in some pieces that we want them to last the next 50 years, at least. And in some other products, we are doing IKEA. Again.

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​In 1998, Portugal hosted Expo ’98, a specialized World’s Fair held in Lisbon from May 22 to September 30. The exposition’s theme, “The Oceans, a Heritage for the Future,” commemorated the 500th anniversary of Vasco da Gama’s voyage to India. The event attracted over 10 million visitors and featured participation from 143 countries and numerous organizations. ​

Expo ’98 significantly transformed Lisbon’s eastern waterfront, converting a 340-hectare industrial area into the Parque das Nações (Park of Nations), a modern urban space. This redevelopment included notable architectural projects such as the Gare do Oriente transport hub by Santiago Calatrava and the Vasco da Gama Bridge.

The Portuguese Pavilion, designed by Álvaro Siza Vieira, became an iconic structure of the Expo, renowned for its distinctive design featuring a large, suspended concrete canopy. ​

Additionally, in 1998, Portugal was among the 11 European nations that met the criteria to adopt the euro as their single currency, marking a significant step in the country’s integration into the European Union’s economic framework.