About The Modern Dane

Rooted in Denmark, Inspired by the Pacific Northwest

Founder Jacob Andsager grew up in Broager, a small coastal town in southern Denmark, surrounded by water, forests, farmland, and the changing seasons. After moving to the U.S. in 2002, he spent a decade in Chicago—a city he still holds dear—before moving to Seattle in 2012.

The Pacific Northwest felt immediately familiar. The water, forests, muted light, and deep connection to nature echoed something Jacob remembered from Denmark.

At the same time, living so far from home made him increasingly aware of the Scandinavian ideas he had grown up with: an appreciation for natural materials, thoughtful design, and the belief that the objects we use every day can quietly improve our surroundings. That eventually sparked an idea: to use the duvet cover as a canvas for nature-inspired design, bringing a sense of Scandinavian calm and craftsmanship into the bedroom.

“We spend a third of our lives in bed, and a duvet cover is one of the largest uninterrupted surfaces in a bedroom. I started thinking about it as a canvas—something that could bring nature and design into the room without overwhelming it.”

The patterns Jacob imagined were not traditional Scandinavian motifs. Instead, he wanted them to feel like personal interpretations of the Nordic landscape: branches, leaves, wildflowers, birds, and the subdued colors of nature. He had a clear idea of what he wanted the bedding to look and feel like. What he didn’t yet know was how to make it.

Rethinking Bedding from the Field Up

What began as a design idea quickly became an education in textiles. Jacob initially assumed the collection would be made from cotton, but the more he learned about conventional cotton production, particularly its dependence on irrigation and agricultural chemicals, the less interested he became in building a new brand around it. His research kept leading him back to linen.

Made from flax, linen offered almost everything he was looking for in a material. Flax is well suited to the temperate climate of Western Europe, the fiber is naturally strong and breathable, and linen becomes softer and more relaxed with use and washing. It also looked completely different from the smooth, uniform bedding that dominated the market.

“I fell in love with the imperfections of it. Linen has texture and movement. It doesn’t need to look pristine to look beautiful. In many ways, that felt very Scandinavian to me.”

The Modern Dane has used linen ever since. Today, our linen begins with flax grown in Western Europe and certified through Masters of FLAX FIBRE™. Our finished bedding is OEKO-TEX® Standard 100 Class 1 certified, the standard’s most stringent product class.

A Trip to Portugal

In 2018, with sketches, ideas, and an increasing amount of textile knowledge, Jacob traveled to Guimarães in northern Portugal in search of someone who could actually make the bedding he had imagined. The trip took him to a textile trade show held inside a centuries-old monastery, where he met a Portuguese manufacturer willing to work with a very small new American bedding company and help turn an idea into a finished collection. That relationship became the beginning of The Modern Dane.

Northern Portugal has a long textile tradition, with generations of expertise in weaving, printing, finishing, cutting, and sewing concentrated within the region. It gave Jacob the opportunity to develop the collection closely with the people actually making it, refining everything from the weight and feel of the linen to the construction details of each piece.

Our bedding is still made in Portugal today. The linen is woven there, our patterns are printed there, and every piece is garment-washed, cut, and sewn there before making its way to us in Seattle. We use a 165 GSM linen: substantial enough to feel reassuring and durable, while remaining breathable, relaxed, and comfortable against the skin.

A Tribute to Scandinavian Nature

The first Modern Dane designs grew directly from Jacob’s memories of Scandinavia and his fascination with the natural world. Rather than creating patterns that felt obviously “Nordic,” he wanted something quieter: a branch, a seed pod, a cluster of leaves, or a bird partly hidden among them. The linen itself was always meant to remain part of the design.

“The fabric has so much character on its own that I never wanted the prints to completely cover it. The design and the linen have to work together.”

That philosophy still guides the collection today. Some of our bedding is patterned and some is solid, but all of it shares the same idea: natural materials, restrained design, and colors that are easy to live with.

The landscapes of Denmark and the Pacific Northwest continue to influence the brand. They are not the same, but they share qualities Jacob is naturally drawn to: water, forests, subdued colors, changing light, and a strong connection between the home and the natural world outside it.

Building the Kind of Company We Would Want to Buy From

The Modern Dane has always been a small, independent business, and that shapes how we operate. We sell directly to our customers, which allows us to invest more in materials and craftsmanship while avoiding traditional retail markups. We produce in relatively small quantities, use recyclable and thoughtfully designed packaging, and work closely with the people making our bedding.

Being a small direct-to-consumer company also means we hear directly from the people sleeping in it. Some of Jacob’s favorite messages come from customers who have redesigned an entire bedroom around one of our patterns, returned years later for another piece, or simply written to say how much they look forward to getting into bed at night.

“There are thousands of people sleeping under our linen now, which still feels slightly surreal to me. When I started, I was thinking about fabric, design, and sustainability. What I didn’t fully anticipate was how personal bedding is. You’re making something that becomes part of people’s homes and their routines every single day.”

That experience has come to define The Modern Dane as much as the original idea did: creating things for the home that bring together thoughtful design, natural materials, skilled craftsmanship, and the comfort of something you genuinely enjoy living with every day.

Jacob Andsager
Founder, The Modern Dane