Red wooden horses run through the blood
of the people in new Nusnäs, Sweden.
Dalahästar, or dala horses, are traditional handicrafts
that have been around for centuries.
They are commonly known as children's toys
or sometimes religious items.
They've also been used as a form of currency.
Today, they are a national symbol.
But only two main factories still make them by hand
with local wood and the traditional Falu red paint.
In early 2020, we visited one of the oldest
Dala horse factories in Sweden
to see how it's kept this tradition still standing.
Artisans here at Nils Olsson Dalahästar
start with locally sourced pine or alderwood.
They stamp the outline of the horse onto the planks.
Carpenters roughly shape the figurine with a band saw.
This is the only part of the process that uses a machine.
And they want to keep it this way.
Mattias Olsson is the grandson of one of
the factory's founding brothers, who started it in 1928.
Today he does everything he can to stick to
the century-old way of making dala horses.
The finer details of each figure are done by hand.
Roland Presthans takes about 15 minutes to carve a horse,
depending on its size.
He's worked at Nils Olsson for about 40 years
and is technically retired,
but he keeps working in his spare time,
because even at 75 years old, he loves the craft.
Then it goes for its first dip to get a solid base coat.
Smaller horses are plunged into a bucket of paint
to cover the whole figurine.
Then they're set on a tray to drip off
and any excess paint dribbles back
down into the bucket to be reused.
And it's not just any old red used to paint them.
It's Sweden's famous Falu red,
a classic rusty red-orange color that comes
from the mines in the region of Dalarna.
After drying, the pieces go through
a series of quality checks with Mattias.
Then they're dipped again to get one or two more coats
to ensure an even color.
Painters like Kerstin Reuterborg have it down to a science.
She lines up her brushes by color so she can work quickly.
And while all the horses are decorated
in the traditional folk art style called kurbits,
painting by hand means each one is unique.
And just like her colleagues, Kerstin is proud of the place
dala horses have in her heritage.
The artisans turn out about 500 horses a day
of all shapes, sizes, and colors,
although red is the traditional and most popular choice.
Americans, and the world at large, were first
introduced to dala horses at the 1939 World's Fair
in New York, where a giant wooden dalahäst
greeted visitors to the Swedish pavilion.
But today, anyone looking for a classic dala horse
can buy one from Nils Olsson, online or at the workshop.
The smallest horses sell for about $20,
and the larger ones can cost about $1,500.
But Mattias is optimistic about the future
for both the business and the art form.