KAY BOJESEN MONKEY X NØRGAARD PÅ STRØGET
Two design icons that suit each other. The Kay Bojesen Monkey was originally created as a clothes hook that could come down to children’s height, but it has grown up to become one of design history’s greatest classics. Now the Monkey has got its own clothes on – and what better to suit a Danish design icon than another Danish design icon? The #101 T-shirt from Nørgaard paa Strøget.
THE WORLD IS CONSTANTLY CHANGING. AND SO IS THE DESIGN WORLD
Season after season, we’re presented with a wealth of new products and creations that fit the current time perfectly and frame the current time perfectly – and then we move quickly on. Next season. Next design. But there are also some design-wise beacons that don’t always keep moving. Everyone knows them. The ones that are so iconic, they stay right on trend, year after year, just being themselves. Milestones in design history that help to give us something to hold on to in these changing and unpredictable times.
With the launch of Kay Bojesen Monkey x Nørgaard paa Strøget, two of the greatest Danish design icons are now joining forces in a declaration of love for durable and long-lasting products. And they really suit each other: Kay Bojesen’s Monkey and Nørgaard paa Strøget’s #101 T-shirt.
The Kay Bojesen Monkey was created back in 1951 when Kay Bojesen wanted to make a children’s level hanger to support kids in reaching their clothes. Instead, he ended up making a world-famous Danish design icon. The #101 T-shirt from Nørgaard paa Strøget was originally designed by Mads Nørgaard’s father, Jørgen Nørgaard, who revolutionized the Danish clothing industry on a cold January morning in 1967 when he placed the first batch of meticulously folded ribbed T-shirts on the shelves in the store Nørgaard paa Strøget in Copenhagen. He called the T-shirt 101 after California’s highway – a road where dreams are made. And you can certainly say that the striped T-shirt has led the way and conquered the world.
In Scandinavia and the rest of the world, people have worked, danced and kissed in the #101 T-shirt. They’ve fallen in love, they’ve cried, done the laundry on a rainy Sunday, all the time while wearing a #101 T-shirt. Every season, the T-shirt comes out in new color variations, meaning that it is constantly both old and new – and always completely on trend. But the basic design has not changed over the years. For more than 50 years, the #101 T-shirt has kept its original look. To this day, the design idea, shape and lines are exactly the same as in the middle of the last century.
IT IS PRECISELY THIS LOVE OF DURABLE AND LONG-LASTING PRODUCTS THAT BINDS MADS NØRGAARD AND KAY BOJESEN TOGETHER
Deep inside, in the top’s fibres and in the annual rings of the wooden figurines is an unchanging, unique and original story that is the essence of everyday design, regardless of the current trends. The kind of design that follows us through life and at the same time helps tell the story of the life that unfolds while we live it – with us as individuals and in the community that unites us as people. A shared understanding and heritage that has given us some of the most iconic milestones in Danish design history.
GET YOUR IMAGINATION GOING
The collaboration with Mads Nørgaard puts Kay Bojesen’s original stories made of wood in a new context and adds more colors and even more humor to the already smiling and vibrant design.
Kay Bojesen had a strong, unpretentious personality and is often said to have brought humor to Danish design with his extraordinary talent for bringing wood to life and creating animals and figurines in the borderline between quality toys and design objects.
This philosophy has made Kay Bojesen’s design a covetable gift item for all ages and occasions – true design classics. And the beautiful black and white #101 stripes on Kay Bojesen Monkey x Nørgaard paa Strøget add just the playful and quirky element that Kay Bojesen loved to add to his designs to tell a fun story and spark the imagination.
You can get Monkey with the beautiful painted T-shirt in either black with white stripes or the most iconic color combination in the #101 T-shirt’s history – white with black stripes. Both colors feature the well-known red neckline, which you can only find on #101 T-shirts in this exclusive Nørgaard paa Strøget version in the store on Amagertorv in Copenhagen. Tradition and renewal.
While the white T-shirts with black stripes and a red neckline have been a true classic in the store for many years, there has never been a black one with white stripes with the red trim at the neck. Until now. Mads Nørgaard is exclusively producing this unique color variant under the name KAY to mark the occasion of the collaboration.
TWO DESIGN ICONS THAT REALLY SUIT EACH OTHER
With the iconic Monkey in new clothes, we build humbly on Kay Bojesen’s design heritage and original stories made of wood with a twinkle in our eye. Kay Bojesen Monkey x Nørgaard paa Strøget is a unique design collaboration with Mads Nørgaard, where we unite love for durable and long-lasting products together, collectively celebrating the humour and the smiling lines with colours and stripes that go far back in Danish design history.
