I've just been on a weird research journey that I thought I'd share. After eating my waffles (today is waffle day) and sending some pics of the waffles and the Easter decorations I put out, someone in England asked me if I could get them "one of those candle holders", namely this one:
This strange black contraption is made of pointy, jagged, metal, and when you see it without any candles or chicks or little figures it looks a little bit like a torture device:
I picked it out from a house full of things that my boyfriend's grandparents had in a cabin that we had to clear. The reason I liked it was because it came with three sets of little figurines that you can swap out for different seasonal celebrations, and I am definitely a fan of kitchy yet practical, cutesy yet odd, household items. Nobody else wanted it... And indeed once we had it at home, any Swedish visitors would remark "oh you've got one of those. My grandparents had one" which essentially means it's an old, unpopular, forgotten-about, out-of-fashion bit of tat, which just makes me like it even more.
Anyway back to being asked whether I could buy one. How do you search for such an item? I did various Google searches in Swedish on the theme of "black metal candle holder easter christmas midsummer" which didn't help. On Tradera (the Swedish version of ebay) one person was selling a modified version of it, but they didn't have a name for it, they called it a candle crown and they didn't have any different sets of figures. It was only once I started to look for replacement sets of figurines that I came accross the name - Toarpskronan - and made the wallet endangering discovery that the company Kinnox still distribute these crowns and little sets of figurines for every conceivable occasion!
According to Kinnox, the crown candle holder was first made by Per Persson, if a name could get more Swedish, in the town of Toarp in the 1800s. It was designed to be a replica of the crown that many Swedish kings and queens wore ceremonially as a lucky power-giving item (see the whole story here).
It would literally put Toarp on the map, if people only knew that the bloody thing was called a Toarpskrona! The crown is used as a claim to fame for Toarp parish:
And might be, at least according to me, the most important item in the very small and very easily missed Museum of Borås. They whip out the crown on special (non-covid) occasions, and invite the public to dress it with accessories.
That was my weird journey for today, thanks for coming with me. I'll see you in Borås for a bit of crown dressing!
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