Kitchen Kinetics: Women's Movements in Sigrun Bülow-Hübe's Research 1

Bülow-Hübe's active participation in the Swedish Women's Club in Montréal foreshadowed her dedication to design spaces women could actually enjoy and not simply work in. The presence of fellow Swedes was also undoubtedly an opportunity to discuss design cultures in both countries and their living experience in Canada. In an undated two-page text specifically prepared for a presentation to the Club, Bülow-Hübe carefully outlines the main points she wanted to express.26 It serves as a clear synopsis of her perception of the status of design in Montréal, after a decade of calling Canada's then-largest city home. She begins, "Why did the homes look that way?" and points to, amongst other things, the absence of a unified national tradition, the lack of political figures with any training in design, and describes Canada as "an impoverished [fattigt in Swedish] country." Her next subheading, "When did Canadians wake up to issues of taste?" highlights the improving Canadian economy after the war and the increase in imports of Modern furniture but also warns against bad pieces still popular then introduced nationwide as a result of many buyers' lack of design expertise. Bülow-Hübe often resisted popular consumer trends in Canada which, in her opinion, were too conservative. Later in her notes, she tells the crowd of fellow Club members that Canadians have acknowledged "lighter wall colors but not white, yet," alluding to the heavy, dark interiors of many traditional Canadian homes at the time. In contrast, Modern Swedish interiors, and especially kitchens, were always painted in a sterile white colour.27 Bülow-Hübe was visibly astounded that Canadians had not adopted a cleaner kitchen aesthetic and, more importantly, that they were reluctant to implement design changes at a federal level. Her involvement with nationwide organizations like the CMHC would become a way to improve housing and kitchen design throughout the country. Triumphantly, she declares that in 1955, as Danish teak furniture broke into the Canadian furniture market, "with it, came the white walls." When she came to Canada, Bülow-Hübe brought her experience as kitchen designer in Sweden and the influences of Swedish research that paid attention to women's movements in domestic spaces.45 This emphasis on the housewife's body undoubtedly influenced Bülow-Hübe's turn towards a focus on women's kinetics and her insistence on the female body as a generator of design. This shift represented a departure fr