Dennis Sjöberg Collection - Part II

From Lehmann and Distler to TinTin and Disney. Our second themed auction from Dennis's collection presents a wide and playful selection of toys and collectibles from the early 20th century onwards. Welcome to discover a theme filled with nostalgia and the joy of collecting.

The world of fantasy is the most beautiful of worlds. Few knew it better than the man behind one of Sweden's most diverse collections of toys. The collection includes thousands of items, from mechanical tin toys and Disney figures to Elastolin soldiers, airplane models, fire engines, dolls, teddy bears and much more. To the great joy of Crafoord Auktioner Stockholm, we can now let yourself be enchanted by it.

Dennis was the only child in the family. As a child, he used to accompany his mother when she had finished cleaning up for the evening at Sluss-Baren by Skeppsbron in Stockholm. They often stopped in front of the shop window of a toy store on Götgatan. It was like an illuminated stage, a fairy tale. They dreamily admired the fascinating colors, shapes and funny functions. His father worked on board the Swedish America Line's ships. Sometimes he would bring home a small gift, but more often fantastic stories about the big world outside. They didn't have a lot of money but were rich in imagination. To six-year-old Dennis at the summer camp at Barnens Ö in Roslagen, his father wrote in a letter: "You take good care of the stamps on the envelope, don't you? And collect beautiful stones for the aquarium!".

Dennis was careful with every little thing even as a child. His nanny was a seamstress. There he cut out and saved pictures of movie stars in Allers weekly magazine. His upbringing inspired him throughout his life. At the age of 15, he cycled to Paris, with a visa that gave him three days to cross Germany. His professional career became one of the creative, exploratory and narrative kind, with trips all over the world. Dennis worked as a photographer and in syndication of journalistic material. As a young film fan, he wrote to the major film companies with return postage and received a wealth of autographs in return. Now he arranged so that he could be present at various film shoots and galas. He met Elvis Presley and the cast of the TV series Dallas, drove the Volvo P1800 that Roger Moore used in the TV series The Saint, and in Houston he got to wear one of the astronaut suits from Apollo 17. As if by chance, many of his trips also coincided with toy auctions of various kinds...

At home, Dennis transformed a large garage into what resembled an elegant museum with hidden wiring, beautiful wallpaper and glass cases for all his toys. It was never about investing or showing off the things - he just enjoyed looking at them. With empathy and meticulous detail, he also arranged around 50 display cabinets with complete miniature scenes: a milliner's hat shop, a dentist's office, an English pub, a butcher's shop with dangling sausages and hams, a flower shop, a music room and of course a toy shop with shelves bursting with excitement. Dennis, a collector, surrounded himself with objects that he found irresistibly beautiful and fascinating. He created worlds full of beauty and playfulness. Or as his wife puts it: "He had an imagination that was out of this world."