The Artist’s Home of Marie Jagd

Set just outside Copenhagen in the quiet neighborhood of Ordrup, the home of architect Marie Jagd feels friendly, tactile, and quietly refine. Working across interiors, furniture, and objects, Marie creates thoughtful designs balancing simplicity, functionality, and honest materials — all handmade in Copenhagen in close collaboration with local makers. Creativity runs through generations in her family, from music and ceramics to architecture and furniture making. Curious about the spaces that shape her creativity, I spoke with Marie about home, craftsmanship, rituals, and the beauty of living with objects made to last.

Bio
Visiting The Artists’ Home of Marie Jagd
Marie’s artistry: Architectural Designer
Living in Copenhagen, Denmark

Your home feels incredibly calm, light and thoughtful. What does “home” mean to you personally?

‘Home is to me a safe space, where I can feel myself deeply, where I can create as well as rest. It’s where I collect the most precious treasures from my life. A place filled with memories, feelings, heirlooms, my loved ones, all my projects, prototypes and a source for inspiration.

I love the light here, the quietness and closeness to the sea. My studio is a part of our home, so it’s a space for my creative practice as well as our family home, which is completely inseparable and intertwined. I try out new furniture and ideas here in a continuous dialogue with my husband Jonas, who is also the skilled cabinetmaker behind all the furniture and interiors, I design. It’s where I help create warm and personal homes and spaces for other people. This feels so natural and meaningful to me. To invite my clients into our home and my studio for meetings, and for them to sense the atmosphere and the fine craftsmanship, is something I really appreciate. I love the personal contact this enables, and to show them how we live ourselves with the piecesand spaces, we create.

My childhood home was filled with the sound of my father practicing his music and my mothers wheel, clay and plaster in her ceramics studio. At my grandparents house, which is the place with an atmosphere and aesthetics that has influenced me the most, they had an architecture and design studio and a small wood workshop. So to me the creative work has always been a very natural part of the home.’

There’s a beautiful balance between old and new in your apartment — family heirlooms, sketches from your grandfather, your son’s paper airplanes, your daughter’s drawings, alongside your own designs that sometimes even your husband built. How do memories and personal objects shape the atmosphere of a space for you?

‘Family heirlooms and personal objects are very important for me to surround myself with in order to feel a sense of belonging to a place. The objects carry memories and stories, and help me feel a connection across time and place to people, who are dear to me, to their spirit, to their craft and what they shaped with their hands - even with skills that are almost lost today. These are objects, I deeply cherish and which have followed me along for so many years. Something found, like a shell or stone, carries a certain meaning, perhaps even secrets, reminding me of a beautiful time somewhere with somebody. But also how rich and inspiring nature is. And, of course, some of the most precious things I have, are the creative works of my children.

The new furniture and work we make together here, are often inspired by my grandparents and their home, but built with the hands of my husband. I really love this close creative collaboration, we have, and how it organically develops and unfolds. I appreciate the beauty and fine quality of his craft so much every day. In a more or less direct way, heirlooms and our own new pieces are beautifully related, and connect me to both the past and the present.’

Creativity seems to run through generations in your family: your father in music, your mother in ceramics, your grandfatherin architecture. In what ways have they influenced the way you create and observe the world? Is there something they all shared?

‘They all share a great sensitivity, and I definitely inherited that. Also a meticulous attention to detail and a good ability to immerse themselves in their work. I have deep respect for that. Because of them, I think I’m used to expecting very high quality and care with materials and craftsmanship, and also that good things take time. My grandfather, and my grandmother too, whom I admire so much for her creativity and ability to shape a warm and inspiring home, is an endless source of inspiration for me. Besides his work as an architect and a teacher at the academy, he designed and built their entire house and almost all furniture, and created a serene interior closely together with my grandmother. The poetic way they lived and worked together is so fascinating to me, and has influenced me a lot.’

You once considered going to the conservatory, and music still seems quietly present in your home. What role does music play in your life today? And is there a piece of music or artist you always return to?

‘Yes, music means much to me, and earlier I played the cello many hours a day. It’s so nourishing for body and mind, I should do it much more often. The resonans from the instrument makes my nervous system calm down, and I just love the sound of the old wood. You need to embrace the cello, and the vibrations go straight to the heart. For some years I was quite ambitious with it, but then I chose again to focus on my architecture studies and found my own path in a field of art, architecture and design.

While working, I almost always listen to music, it helps me focus. Before noon only classical music works for me, and I always return to Bach and Brahms. Later in the day I love Brazilian music from different decades or Jonas’ African vinyls. For the largest part of my life my father played the double bass in The Royal Danish Orchestra, so I use to listen to many concerts and performances. I find the atmosphere at the theatre absolutely enchanting. Our home without musical instruments is for me very hard to imagine, and I always enjoy to hear my children experiment with sounds, or to practice with them. There is a lot of music in my family, so I would like to pass it on to them, just a little bit at least.

What is the favorite corner in your home to work from?

‘The corner in my studio at the window, where I have my more than 3 metre long table with all the materials, samples, hand notes and sketches, tools, my children’s drawings and all the work in process. It’s a space for me to immerse myself, be introverted in order to be able to create. Exactly in the same way, as when I was a child - it was my safe and quiet space there at the drawing table.

But I use the whole studio and the livingroom too, since there are always many projects and processes taking place at once. A lot of creative mess. And I enjoy how my children come home from school and sometimes immediately continuous my drawing at the table or paper folding on the floor.’

Your work shows a variety in designs for interiors, furniture, architecture, and objects, all with such sensitivity toward materials and proportions. What draws you most to working on a smaller, more intimate scale and collaborating with local makers?

‘As an architect, I love working in this smaller scale, where I can follow each process from beginning to end and have a personal and close contact with both the clients and in the collaboration with my local makers, who are the best in their field. I need to have the production close to me, so I can sense and see and feel it all. And it must be as sustainable as possible. It’s very important for me to know, where the wood comes from and that it’s the same persons, who handpick the wood for each project as well as building it and installing it in the end at the client’s home.

The wooden interior, furniture and objects are all handmade by Jonas and his co-founder’s workshop in central Copenhagen, and I’m extremely grateful for this close collaboration I have with them. A local upholstery does the finest textile work. My soap is handmade in Jutland by experts in natural soap making, and the packaging will be handmade at a traditional letterpress in Stockholm. We have such fine traditions of craftsmanship of the best quality here in Denmark and Scandinavia, and I strongly want to support that with my little business. It’s the base of it and a highest priority for me.’

Your work balances simplicity, functionality, and beautiful materials so naturally. It feels timeless — much like the dining chairs inherited from your grandparents. What draws you to create designs that are everlasting rather than follow trends?

‘My aim is to design pieces and spaces that do not need too much explanation, but where the quality of the material and the fine craftsmanship is emphasized and highlighted. There must be an equal balance and coherence between the material, the craftsmanship and the design. And when there is, the pieces can last for many generations. Also, a lot of what I design can be customized, or is only made to measure, which makes people consider very carefully what they need. I hope to create pieces and object that people want to keep for long, and to care for and perhaps even repair one day. Furniture of high quality and beautiful material only gets more and more beautiful with age.

The J39 chairs I have had since I moved away from home. They remind me of my grandparents house and the beautiful, calm and inspiring atmosphere there. My Dining Table 01 I designed for these chairs. But of course it goes with any chairs. I hope, the simplicity and honest materials makes the designs, I do, a little timeless.’

I loved discovering your new soap and the Plinth Soap Dish. What was the idea behind creating such an everyday object, and what makes a simple ritual meaningful to you?

‘Everyday life, with all its routines and repetitions, is so important. Working in this small scale for the hand and all the senses, by celebrating the act of bathing and cleansing as a little quiet and intimate ritual with beautiful pure and natural materials, is very meaningful to me. I find the space and the culture around this so interesting.

I designed the Plinth soap dish out of a need for a simple sculptural object for ourself and the bar soaps that we love to use in our home. One that would develop a beautiful wooden patina over time and that wouldn’t brake in the bathroom or kitchen. Now, in close collaboration with my local soap maker in Denmark, I have created a natural and organic cold-proceeded soap to fit the Plinth perfectly. It’s so satisfying to work with nourishing organic oils and butters for the skin, with texture and scent, and to create a little product, you can use every day. We haven’t added scent or colour to it, so the natural smell is just from the pure organic materials, it’s made of. Earlier I have done a lot of plaster casting and sculptures, so I find this soap casting processes very interesting.’

Your bookshelves are filled with philosophy, architecture, sketches, soap samples, wood samples, little treasures and paper studies — all in these beautiful quiet tones. What inspires you most lately, outside the world of architecture itself?

‘Nature inspires me so much, and we are fortunate to live very close to both the sea and the forest. A walk on the beach in any weather, listening to the sea, the smell of salt in the air, filling my pockets with treasures from the shore.. this always fills me up. My children and the way they investigate and examine the world. All their questions. I’m inspired by the body, by human proportions. The movements of the body. By sculpture. Bathing culture and rituals, which I want to study much more.

Scents inspire me very much, and I daily use scents to support different moods and feelings, to create a certain atmosphere in a space. I’m so inspired by memory and perception, and I have always been working with memories in various ways and in different materials and media. Both the personal memories and the more collective. I’m fascinated by how we remember and what recalls a memory, how it’s contained, how it changes throughout life. Again, the objects, the scents, the body, the house. Rachel Whiteread has hit something in me very early and I still love returning to her works.’

Your spaces and objects seem designed not only for function, but for slowing down and truly living with them. What are the small moments in daily life that currently bring you the most joy?

‘The early morning sunlight in the bedroom, and how warm it hits the walls, we recently painted, soft like velvet. Opening my armoire in the same room, always being embraced by the beautiful solid oak doors. Our balcony, which is like a little 1st floor garden, where we grow many plants and the children harvest berries during the summer, brings us a lot of pleasure.

The Cove sofa, I just designed for a client, and one for our own home too, I really enjoy. It’s so comfortable! We are still in a process of gently renovating our apartment from 1924, so actually what also brings me a lot of joy, is to study all the many beautiful, original details and materials luckily kept here, and to sketch on a new kitchen, to dream and discuss it with my husband - however, he is not always as eager as I am to look at these topics late in the evening.’

Anything exciting coming up for you soon that you'd like to share?

‘I just begun two new lovely interior projects for private clients. I’m looking so much forward to dive into the process of creating a beautiful cohesive and aesthetic interior for them. It’s respectively a home and a creative studio in Copenhagen and a gentle renovation of a summerhouse at the Danish coast. And then I’m excited to launch my new soap in late summer. It’s been such a lovely sensory experience to work with the texture and qualities of the natural materials. All enveloped in a new beautiful packaging.’

Visit the website by Marie Jagd for more of her work.