Midwest Summer

Every summer, like clockwork, we’d pack up the car and make the 24-hour drive from the West Coast to the quiet lake our family has gathered around for generations. Long stretches of highway framed by fields. Rest stops and roadside oddities. The Geese in Flight sculpture rising unexpectedly from the plains of North Dakota. The silhouettes of water towers starting to dot the landscape more frequently (the unofficial welcome signs of the Midwest.)

By the time we reached the final dirt road, just one winding lane lined with trees and dust, we knew we were close. We’d fling the car doors open, still rolling, and run barefoot down that last stretch alongside it, racing each other to the cottage. My dad did the same thing when he was a kid. It was how we arrived: breathless, laughing, home.The cottage is humble, then slowly transformed over decades to fit a growing, evolving family. Always waiting. Always familiar.

Midwest Summer is built from those memories: catching minnows barefoot in the shallows, kayaking to the sandbar, early mornings on the fishing boat and Grandpa’s quiet company, trips into town for bulk candy and melty ice cream cones. Afternoons melted into evenings with my dad playing guitar in the living room, the screen door open to a warm breeze and the smell of sunscreen still lingering on our skin.

This collection is an ode to those kinds of summers—the ones that don’t require plane tickets or passports, just a return to the places that have shaped us. The pieces are designed to feel lived in and effortless, like something you’ve owned for years. They’re made for dock lounging and gravel road walks, for flipping through magazines or watching the sun over the water.

At Sønderhaus, everything we make is rooted in heritage. The Midwest is stitched into our story, a link back to our Scandinavian roots, where ease is a way of life, not a lack of intention.

Sometimes, the most extraordinary summers are the ones you already know by heart.