As an amateur picnic planner, fan of Swedish industrial design pioneer Sigvard Bernadotte, and resident of Stockholm, with access to all its classified ad websites, it was only inevitable that one day I would come home with this.

(Photo courtesy of the person I bought it from on Blocket)

Swedish people love being outside when the weather is nice and they take every opportunity to exploit the sunshine. I don’t think I’m exaggerating too much if I say that they are obsessed with the out of doors.

On super sunny and warm days, one could begin to wonder if there are actually people inside any of the buildings. Another question that comes to mind is: don’t these people have jobs?

So, mind you, a stroll past any park or tiny patch of grass on a sunny day will inevitably produce an incalculable number of picnickers. The moment you try to start counting is the moment you’ve booked the rest of your day.

Many of these are impromptu picnics, rather than your standard-issue red-and-white plaid blanket picnics. Lunch breaks become stationed in the grass as easily as coffee breaks and beer circles.

I feel like my ability to take advantage of the summer’s picnics will be all the more enhanced by the addition of this set of tools to my picnic arsenal.

Produced in the 1960’s by Husqvarna, this professional-grade picnic set is a major acquisition and will be instrumental in taking me from being a mere picnic hobbyist to a mid-level picnic enthusiast.

Sigvard Bernadotte, who I have written extensively about (see The Would-be King is Dead and The Design Prince of Sweden) is known for his special blend of style and functionality.

This picnic set is Scandinavian throughout. Refined but practical. Mass-produced yet beautiful. Vintage but modern.

I’ll say this is no sissy French picnic set: wine glasses nestled in a thatched basket with miniature cheese knives in different shapes for different types of cheese. (Mon dieu! Did he just use the Brie knife on the the chevre?)

Nor is it an extreme American setup: a metal cooler that holds 24 cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon and has a gas-powered Coleman grill built into the top. (Pop open a cold one and fire up the grill, y’all!)

Indeed! There will be no such rogues gathered around my gentleman’s picnic set this summer.

I shall invite only gaggles of Swedish girls who braid their hair in the front, then clip it in the back, or wear crowns of flowers, or still think that tights are pants.

They can all come by and use me for my picnic set, but I’ll be the one taking it home at the end of the night. So you do the math.