Amid cries of disgust, blasphemy, irritation and downright hatred, in July IKEA began a move to Verdana – a web-safe font designed by Matthew Carter and deployed by Microsoft as part of the operating system, as well as in the Office software appliactions and Internet Explorer on both Macintosh and Windows beginning in 1996. According to figures on Wikipedia, Verdana is available on 97.46% of all Windows and 94.13% of all Macintosh computers, making it the 5th and 6th most common font respectively. Because a proprietary license is required, it is less common on Linux systems.
The round forms in Futura’s ‘O’ really mimicked the Swedish meatballs before. Now we’re left … yearning for the glory days when IKEA embraced continuity between their typography and meat products1.
Why, IKEA? WHY??
“I think it’s safe to say we were surprised by the response,” says IKEA spokeswoman Monika Gocic. In order to avoid expensive licensing costs, in 2001 IKEA abandoned New Century Schoolbook and Futura (which had been in use since 1970) in favor of IKEA Sans, IKEA Serif and IKEA Script which they had had developed for their exclusive use. However, these fonts are not
We got an advance copy (well, a few – woo-hoo!) of the 2010 IKEA US Kitchens Catalog, and we’ve been busy scanning images in between drooling over the new offerings. New AKURUM doorstyles, new appliances, and new countertops, oh my! Thanks goes out to my IKEA Angels who sent them to me – from what I understand, you can expect to find them in stores in a few weeks. We’ll offering an early copy to at least one lucky IKEAFAN – details to come!
Meanwhile, we’ll be blogging about what we’ve found inside the covers, but to squelch your hunger, we’ve quickly scanned the new doorstyles available for the AKURUM Kitchens line for you to drool over and to get an idea of the price structure. Don’t forget IKEA now has a 25 year warranty on kitchen doors. Learn more about IKEA Kitchen Quality.
For those new to IKEA Kitchen Planning, the Akurum line encompasses all the cabinet boxes. Each individual style of door has its own name, like ADEL, ABSTRAKT, RUBRIK or FAGERLAND, as do handles, like KOSING, LANSA, and SPANN. There are additional components which help complete the cabinets, such as RATIONELL and RATIONELL VARIERA accessories, CAPITA or UTBY legs and PERFEKT panels, specialty pieces and toekicks. Read all about the Component System of the AKURUM (and FAKTUM for you Euro types) Kitchen Lines.
Download to see the new IKEA Kitchens Doorstyles for the 2010 catalog year after the jump!
IKEA Catalogs are in the air! Take our poll on the right or reply to this post to let us know if you’ve got your catalog – some stores, like the franchise owned IKEA Houston got their catalogs out early this year, but many market areas are shipping at alternate dates. Some, like IKEA Brooklyn, won’t send out IKEA catalogs to their customer list until late August. Where are YOU on the list? (After the jump, we’ll tell you how to get one early this year!) Get on the list now.
If you just can’t wait, you can see the 2010 IKEA US Catalog online now – IKEA’s gotten hip and with it, and you can now share from the online IKEA catalog directly to Facebook.
This year, if you’re in Twin Cities (Minneapolis / St. Paul for those of you who aren’t), you can get your IKEA catalog early by being one of the first 10 to show up at the IKEA Fans Meet and Greet in the IKEA Twin Cities Restaurant at 3pm on Saturday, August 8th. Yay! Be the first on your block to get a catalog – IKEA’s not shipping them until next week in Minnesota, so we’re your best bet for an early catalog without
Thanks goes to AnnaCarin Sweden for sending these photos of her experience at the IKEA Exhibition, IKEA AT LILJEVALCHS in Stockholm, Sweden! This exhibition is on through August 30th, and the cost is only 69 SEK. See her pictures below!
The exhibition is a retrospective of IKEA furniture and marketing from the beginning in an exhibition space of 1200 square meters. Enter through Thomas Sandell’s large-size PS cabinet, and explore the various exhibition rooms, such as the ‘Denim Room’ which is full of IKEA furniture in denim from the 1970’s as well as the ‘Designer’s Room’ which tells the tale of IKEA designers and their design process. The ‘Gustavian Room’ features original Gustavian period furnishings and the IKEA reproductions that were sold during the 1990’s.
We’ve got a sneak peek at the new for 2010 IKEA Kitchen line, thanks to some quick thinking members on IKEAFANS.com! When the IKEA website was getting an update the other night, IKEA Fan fpa caught some screenshots so that we could all enjoy a lurid lookey-loo ahead of time. The slideshow appears to be disappearing and reappearing so don’t be surprised if you can’t find it on IKEA.com
There are some awesome new offerings, including what appears to be a copper door (oh, be still my heart!) that I would guess to be part of the RUBRIK line. 2010 also sees the return of ABSTRAKT Grey, though it looks to be a richer, darker grey than the grey of years’ past and the introduction of some bold colors in the ABSTRAKT RUBRIK APPLAD (thanks for the correction, wd40!) line, including Orange and Yellow!
designbymeiny checked out the local IKEA today to see if there were any new introductions on the floor, and although there was disappointment on that front, we did learn that the BRAVAD and UDDEN lines are being discontinued while the VARDE line of freestanding kitchen pieces is being extended.
The 2010 IKEA Catalog launch is going to be held in NYC on July 28th, 2009. Once again, we’re invited!!! OMG, so excited! So many cool things in a new catalog – I could stay up all night poring over it. Not to mention what a fantastic time we had last year at the launch and all the follow up activities with other IKEA Fans.
We just got our invite to this year’s launch! We want to go again! We want to bring you with us!! (This is a HINT, people: there will be a contest and there will be a winner.)
Too bad we are poor. IKEA doesn’t pay us. We do this out of the goodness of our hearts (and the goodness of Google, which in the past year hasn’t been as good as we’d have hoped) and NYC is uh-spensive! If you are able, please toss a few coins in the pot to offset the costs of bringing the first news of what’s to come in the new 2010 catalog to you!
2009 IKEA Catalog Launch Reprise
I believe there were 13 IKEAFANS’ staff of moderators, community mentors and admins in attendance at the launch party! We drooled over the new offerings, got to nosh with the IKEA bigwigs (Pernille Spiers-Lopez even), and some of us (whose names shall not be mentioned) danced on tiny IKEA tabletops toward the end of the evening. A grand time was had by all!
We spent the following days in NYC and on Saturday we had a Meet & Greet at IKEA Red Hook and our own private tour of the newly minted IKEA Brooklyn with Store Manager Mike Baker. Mike was terrific! He gave us a tour, a slideshow presentation and a fabu Swedish luncheon to boot. We got the outside view and learned some interesting facts about IKEA Brooklyn and its history as the IKEA that took the longest to build. Afterwards, we met up at the local pub and had a few drinks with Mike and Luis Fernandez, Assistant Manager.
There’s lots more to tell, but we’ll share that over dinner and drinks in NYC, say…9pm? July 27th?
Awesome marketing idea, though I think the world could do without yet MORE IKEA catalogs. It IS the 3rd most printed item in the world. After the Bible and Harry Potter, apparently. IKEA, you’re slipping! You used to be number 1.
IKEA Family Live in Poland is the most recent focus of ongoing debates about what constitutes a family. In the most recent IKEA Family Live 2009 publication, 12 archetypes of different family makeup are presented under the slogan “Family life is changing … Welcome to the new era.” One of the 12 example families presented is Ian and Steve, page 54 -57, who have no interest in having children, but enjoy their IKEA Kitchen and herb garden (and their AWESOME HOUSE!).
IKEA Catalog 
2010 IKEA US Kitchens Catalog
We’ve got a sneak peek at the new for 2010 IKEA Kitchen line, thanks to some quick thinking members on IKEAFANS.com! When the IKEA website was getting an update the other night, IKEA Fan 
