Panduro Hobby – Crafting and creativity across three colourful floors

In the country of hygge, hobbying and crafting are a Big Deal. This is because time spent quietly and warmly indoors, while the air freezes outside and the light takes its leave, is a thing that gives comfort. Spending time together is important to Danish families and, in a country so admired for its strong design credentials, creativity is prized. So it follows that Panduro Hobby, a stone’s throw from Nørreport Station and Torvehallerne, feels almost like a temple to it.

Here there are three floors filled with every possible pen, paint, material, tool and fabric you could possibly need for almost any creative project. It’s a total treasure trove for kids – all kids – even if yours don’t seem to show much interest in drawing or craft.

On the ground floor, the seasonal crafting projects are displayed. Through September and October, Halloween features heavily, despite not having been alive and kicking in Denmark for more than about five years (we have another deeply traditional dress-up opportunity a few days before Ash Wednesday called Fastelavn). From mid-October through to the end of December, Christmas of course takes up the majority of floor space (and jul being completely epic here, there are countless little kits – some cheesier than others – for both adults and kids, whether to make your own Christmas nisser (elves) or a wreath for the door). Near the tills on this floor are aisles and aisles of pens, sketchbooks and paper, paint, palettes and brushes for more grown-up painting projects.

The stuff directed squarely at kids is upstairs. Here there is a whole wall of Hama Beads, which despite being a crime to the planet, are loved by kids in Denmark whatever their sex (the number of little flat Poké Balls kicking around my house is mind-boggling!). There are kits for making swords, masks and other dress-up accessories, activity books, plenty of poster paints, pen sets divided into different age brackets, boxes of beads for jewellery making and masses of other bits and bobs.

In the middle of this floor, is all kinds of cake making and decorating paraphernalia, and beyond, bolts of fabric, an aisle of felt and a whole load of tubes containing different buttons (which my boys always beg for, being obsessed with the idea of having a button collection). There’s FIMO and other clays, materials for making or weaving hangings, and there are friendship bracelet kits.

Up some stairs beyond all this is one of my favourite areas: wool and embroidery. Having been a strong knitter as a child, I am always drawn to the wool section! The embroidery kits for adults are traditional and lovely, with plenty of very Scandinavian designs and some gorgeously old-fashioned things for Christmas, including a kit for making a kind of calendar that has small brass rings attached to it to tie tiny presents to. There are also, of course, carousels of silky embroidery threads in every possible colour.

I have given more than a few of the significant little girls in my life one of the excellent child-friendly starter embroidery kits Panduro does. Whether extremely small and basic or larger in scale, they depict things that all kids like – horses, pandas and the like – and are thankfully not too girly.

The basement is my nine-year-old son’s favourite area. There’s a lot of wood items here, with more robust paints, glue guns and the like for decorating it all with. He has a thing for the small treasure chests you can buy, as well as the polystyrene cubes that can be bought and painted to make real Minecraft scenes (these tend to sell out FAST). There are also polystyrene balls for, yes, self-creating more Pokémon merch, and there are kits for making small worlds for woodland creatures or fairies.

Panduro Hobby is not the cheapest place to buy all this, but it’s so incredibly comprehensive and so appealing and inspirational in the way it’s displayed. We go a couple of times a year and try not to get sucked in by the deals (hard) or by the very nice but slightly pushy sales staff. Because, as a place to take kids for a little treat, I think it has a lot of value for the way it sparks their imaginations.

Open

Mon-Thu, 10am-6pm; Fri, 10am-7pm; Sat, 10am-4pm; Sun, noon-4pm.

Nørre Farimagsgade 74
1365 København K

33 15 44 21
panduro.com/da-dk

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