IKEA's smart city project reimagines future home design

[NelsonG]

This summer, IKEA explored the future of home and the city spaces we share by collaborating with the H22 City Expo, held from May to July in Helsingborg, Sweden.

A partner of the large-scale city expo, IKEA hosted exhibitions and events across two sites in Sweden: Magasin 405 with Skogen in Oceanhamnen, and DM at Drottninghög. These included a modular, transportable forest with flatpack dwellings, an IKEA Mall with home design products from the company, and a series of 60 short documentaries about home in different countries.

"In a straight collaboration with the city and the local community, we created for H22 City Expo unique meeting places, and we are exploring the future of Life at Home, inside and outside the four walls," says Belén Frau, global communication manager of Ingka Group, IKEA's holding company. "We want to test and learn how to lay a foundation where locally relevant initiatives and activities can be upscaled and later be taken to other Ingka Group markets."

The name of the event in the Drottninghög area, DM, stands for Do More, which is a brand powered by Ingka Group that's testing a new business model for community engagement. It's a multipurpose marketplace with pop-up stores, markets, urban farms, a food court, events, school activities, and a place to meet and greet.

“We hope that DM, together with our other meeting-points, will be a positive force in the local community, creating jobs and giving the residents the opportunity of creation and togetherness," says Fredrik Håkansson Lundh, area manager, IKEA Retail Sweden.

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