Ingvar Kamprad’s Ikea: A Curbed primer

Whether you go for the affordable modern furniture or the famously delicious Swedish meatballs, Ikea is about as mainstream as a furniture brand can get. The world’s largest furniture retailer, Ikea has over 350 stores in 29 countries, and a host of products that have become household names (Malm! Billy! Kallax!).

Over the weekend, Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad passed away at the age of 91, leaving behind a global furniture empire that originally began as a mail-order home goods business in 1943. In the following decades, the decisions that helped keep Ikea prices low—remarkably simple design, flat-pack shipping, etc.—are also what customers have come to know and appreciate.

We’ve published all sorts of things about Ikea over the years, from a journey to its birthplace in Sweden to its U.S. influence to a dictionary of the company’s umlaut-laden product names. Highlights are compiled below for your reading convenience.

1. Visiting Älmhult, Sweden, where Ikea was born

© Inter IKEA Systems B.V. 2016

2. The 7 best penny-pinching ways of Ingvar Kamprad

3. One day at Ikea’s biggest store in the U.S.

Photo by Chris Mueller

4. How Ikea became America’s furniture-selling powerhouse

5. The Ikea cult shelf that a Curbed editor just can’t quit

6. Ikea product names, demystified

7. Toast over 30 years of Ikea in the U.S. with these vintage photos