DLoFre's Campus (1) - Paradise for Scandinavian interior and fabric fans

During the 10-day holiday, my sister, who lives in Tokyo, stayed at our parents’ house for a while. Her husband came to Hamamatsu on May 4, and we went to DLoFre's Campus together (My father, who doesn't like to go out, stayed at home and prepared our dinner). Though this was the first time to visit there, my mother found the way relatively easily when she drove the car.

It was my sister’s husband who suggested to go there. At first, I wondered why he knew about DLoFre's Campus, because I didn’t think it was so famous. However, when we arrived there, I recognized that I was wrong. The parking area was full of cars, and many of them were from outside of Shizuoka Prefecture, judging from the number plates.

It was before noon. First, we went to DLoFre's Café to have lunch. To our surprise, it was already full of people, and we learned that we had to wait for 150 minutes to have a table. My sister took a number, and we went out.

DLoFre's Campus consists of many shops mainly selling furniture, fabric, kitchenware, etc. from Northern Europe, especially Finland (I heard Finnish TV crew came to report it some years ago).  One of them is DLoFre's Interior, where I took several pictures of items that I thought very Nordic. 

These are candle stands from Sweden, I guess.

Candlelight created a cozy atmosphere.

Finnish and Swedish people love coffee. There were packs of coffee filters in a birch bark box. Birch bark crafts are traditional crafts in both countries. 

This is a Finnish Christmas ornament called “himmeli (heaven)” made of straw. 

They were also selling glass of Iittala in Finland.

Each shop had interesting goods. For example, Scandinavian Kirpputori (flea market) had ceramic cats made by Lisa Larson. She is a Swedish ceramic artist winning popularity in Japan.

These are vintage cups and saucers made by Arabia in Finland.

If you are a marimekko fan, you must visit mari&deco bar with colorful paper napkins

and Marimekko Gallery that is the only official retailer of Marimekko in Hamamatsu. In addition to these, there is a shop with 300 kinds of fabric of Marimekko and other brands.

In the premises of DLoFre's Campus, we saw very Japanese-looking houses.

This was originally a warehouse but is used as a bookstore now.

There I found a best-seller comic book in Finland “Finnish Nightmares.” It describes how a typical Finn Matti feels in certain situations, and many Japanese readers have commented on the Internet that Matti resembles Japanese people. It may be true.