We recently learned about the work of Danish paint company Linolie & Pigment from architects Mentze Ottenstein who utilized the brand’s Aqualinum paint on the interiors of the Dinesen country house renovation. With a focus on linseed paint and colored wood oils, Linolie & Pigment is ripe for historical surfaces and restoration projects. In fact, founder Thor Grabow took part in his first restoration project at the age of 17 when his parents restored their old farm in Blirup, a town south of Aarhus in Denmark. Thor was allowed to participate in the process, shadowing restoration architect Nikolaj Hyllestad and learning the tradition of limewash and linseed oil. Thor visited a paint factory where he witnessed the process of dusty pigment and oil being transformed into a richly colored paint. “I was more than fascinated, and only in a way that an outspoken 17-year-old can come up with, I asked directly if I could buy the factory when it someday went on sale,” he explains. After studying as a building designer and working in a restoration office, that day came: Thor bought the color production and set up Linolie & Pigment, becoming a favorite source of architects in Scandinavia and beyond.
Above: A line of breathable Satin Wood Oil offers a wash of transparent color where wood grain shows through. By saturating the wood itself, the linseed oil product causes pigment to bind to the wall, nourishing while protecting surfaces.
Above: Shown here in a house in Sweden, walls are finished in the Ella Ø 8 shade of Satin Wood Oil.
Above: Mentze Ottenstein applied the Aqualinum paint, a style of indoor paint designed to “bridge the gap between traditional techniques and sensible materials,” Thor describes. The paint is produced without microplastics, solvents, or harsh preservatives. Photograph by Monica Grue Steffensen from The House of Dinesen, Reimagined by Copenhagen-based Mentze Ottenstein.
Above: At Gyldenholm, a manor house southwest of Copenhagen, walls are painted in Aqualinum and the woodwork is painted with linseed oil paint. 
Above: A restoration project bringing the doors of Christian VII’s Amalienborg Palace back to a rich, yellow-brown color.
Above: “We rubbed the surface with a cloth and got into the layer of wet paint underneath” explains Thor. “We took the cloth with us home and mixed the color by this reference.”
Above: Another application of the Satin Wood Oil on untreated kitchen cabinets. The oil can be applied to untreated wood (walls, floors, and furniture), concrete, cork, and other absorbent materials. Shown here is Helsinki 31 in the renovated kitchen of a 1967 building originally designed by architects Eyvind Retzius and Svein Bjoland.
Above: Thor in the factory, located in a former cooperative dairy in the Danish village of Øsby.
Above: A view of an open can: “We can mix custom colors as desired just from a small scrape of old paint, an object or a color code,” the brand explains.
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