Alicia Vikander’s Vogue cover made a lot of people happy, but no one more so than the Swedish press, who, proud of their homegrown talent, reported that The Danish Girl actress was the first Swede to enjoy the honor in decades. It was 44 years ago, to be exact, that model Gunilla Lindblad, a muse to Helmut Newton, appeared on the February 1972 cover. (The only other Scandinavian actress to enjoy the honor was sexy Britt Ekland, who was cast as a Bond Girl after she was a Vogue cover girl.)
Pre-Gunilla, Swedish Lisa Fonssagrives-Penn, who said that she’d “never seen a fashion magazine” before her first Vogue test, appeared on the cover 11 times. And there were plenty of Scandinavian beauties inside the magazine, as well. Ford Models founder Eileen Ford was partly responsible for popularizing the blue-eyed Nordic look in the early ’60s. She was particularly keen on the Swedes, saying: “They work hard, and they look more American than American girls.”
The stereotypic Swede may be blonde and blue-eyed, but like most stereotypes, it’s not quite right. Elfin Frida Gustavsson, for example, is a very different type than girl-next-door Charly Stember, who was an original Charlie girl in the 1970s.
As Stockholm Fashion Week commences, we look back at Swedish models in Vogue.
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