Over the past Few years I have been slowly expanding my range of Norwegian inspired creations, sharing my love of my heritage through what I design, make and bake. I affectional referred to it as “a little taste of Norway” for some time before I actually started using it as part of how I grouped the things I designed and made which had a Norwegian connection.

Ive always been proud of my heritage and interested in learning more about where my family comes from but also keeping the connection alive for my own children and hopefully generations to come. My Norwegian family roots are on my mothers side and her family original come from Brønnøysund in the artic circle in the north of Norway (home of the famous Torghatten mountain which has a huge hole going right through it). But now my family is clustered around Solo near Stavanger on the west coast and the capital Oslo.

As a child I spent a lot of time in Norway and everything I remember from these family holidays influences me and my designs and no more so than seen in my newest addition to my range.

In 2019 we visited Norway in May for the celebration of Norway’s National Constitution Day. The 17th May is a national holiday and across the country children’s parades led by marching bands walk through their communities. We were staying near Oslo, it was just a short tube ride into the centre where all roads are closed and thousands of people line them waving flags and shouting “hurra!”. In Oslo, the parade is greeted by the royal family who wave to the crowds from the Royal Palace balcony and Norwegian flags adorned Karl Johans gate,the main road to the palace.

The Norwegian flag can be seen everywhere and although most shops are closed the window displays are bursting with red, white and blue designs. It’s a day spent celebrating with family and displaying their heritage in the most stunning way showing off their bunads. Bunads are Norwegian traditional costumes and their designs indicate where in Norway your family has heritage roots.

Usually you have a bunad designed for your confirmation but they are not cheap, often there made to order and their is strict laws on its production. Each region in Norway has a unique style, colour and cut but within a region there can be several designs or colours available as well as different customisable options.

In recent years the rules have been relaxed slightly to permit ‘festival dresses’ folkedrakt / Festdrakt to be allowed to be sold, these are a generic non region specific design, meaning everyone can own a custom for such an occasion. As children my mother made us children’s dresses in traditional fabrics but as these no longer fit, this year we invested in some festival dresses for this special family celebration and our first actual 17th Mai in the country ( has to fall on a weekend for us to attend due to my eldest now being at school).

May 2019 was a hot one with record temperatures for the time of year, just perfect when your wearing woollen lined dresses and long sleeved thick shirts! The celebration of the Norwegian Constitution Day is a party like no other and the atmosphere is so friendly and welcoming if you ever get the chance to be out in Norway at this time of year it’s a highly recommended experience.

It was fascinating seeing such a broad array of designs and some I’ve never seen before as well as some very old styles and even a few rare Sami costumes. It was wonderful seeing several generations in matching region designs and all the children so smartly dressed as well.

We also visited the West-Telemark Museum, Eidsborg a region my family has ties too. The museum was full of information and stunning preserved examples of these intricate bunads and methods of making. Understanding how they were and are still made highlighted the amount of work which goes into making all the elements from the braided ribbons to the clasps and silver fittings and decorative jewellery.

When I returned home for our amazing stay in Norway I was so inspired to research more about bunads and there regional designs, I wanted to somehow create something to help share these beautiful traditional dresses and tell the story of these costume through my work.

I’ve always wanted to paint more after having studied art all those years ago but although it’s always influenced my graphic design work, physical painting isn’t something I’ve done for many years. So it was so nice to get working on something new which ignited the love for painting as well as learning more about my heritage.

After much research and conversations with family to ensure I had correctly identified designs I began work on some trial peg dolls. I started with the designs associated with regions my family are from -Telemark and Nordlands. Then I began to add to the set with a mixture of styles and colours to give a small insight into the striking and differing designs available.

I first hand sketched out designs converting real life photos of bunads to peg doll shaped designs. Then I transferred these to the 3D peg doll in pencil to ensure each design encapsulated enough of the style cut and shape of the dresses. Then painting began in a series of block colours Initially before adding the embroidery detail. Bunad designs are very intricate and it would be impossible to exactly replicate the beautiful designs but I wanted to do justice to the designs by including as much detail as possible.

As I became more confident with the new type of paints I was using and with the templates for each bunad design I started to free hand paint the designs. It took three weeks to complete x40 peg dolls as my first round of bunad dolls to take to my Christmas fair last year as a test item (read more about the scandimarket 2019) and they were a big hit with both those who knew about bunads and wanted the regions they had links to but also those who appreciated them as traditional dresses. I promised to paint a lot more for the coming year as these would now become permanent design within “my little taste of Norway range”

I have already started the base painting for some new designs and will be adding to the regions featured to expanded the original set of 11, the regions that now group the areas in Norway was redefined in January of this year and I hope to try and include at least one from each area but as I paint to order I can in theory design any bunad design and look forward to any commissions for particular styles and regions.

If you are Interested in my Norwegian bunad peg dolls or have any questions please feel free to contact me and I’ll do my best to help!! I hope to gets these peg dolls on my Etsy shop seasonally and can customise if there is a bunad you’d like which isn’t featured, they can be free standing for display cabinets or feature a small hook if you wish to hang it, like i did for my christmas tree decorations.

Watch this space as I continue to expand my Norwegian range…

**these are decorations only and not suitable for small children, these are not toys**