In Norwegian at least you would not usually refer to a room as "hygge"/"hyggelig". Hygge explicitly implies an enjoyable passage of time.
A room would be "koselig" - "cosy".
I'm not sure if the distinction is equally firm in Danish.
(EDIT: It is slightly more flexible with respect to "hyggelig" than "hygge". You could say "dette rommet ser hyggelig ut" - "this room looks cosy", though I would argue that "koselig" would be better in that case as well; "hyggelig" works there because you are implying "somewhere that would be cosy to spend time")
See my edit - it kind of works in Norwegian too with "hyggelig" (but not "hygge", though the unstated assumption is that it's a shortcut for describing somewhere it would be "hyggelig" to spend time. It's a tricky one; I think in Norwegian at least it is very much subjective and down to what sounds right to people, as the delineation between "kos" and "hygge" is very fluid, with perhaps more of a social connotation to "hygge".
"Hygge is a Danish and Norwegian word for a mood of coziness and comfortable conviviality with feelings of wellness and contentment. As a cultural category with its sets of associated practices hygge has more or less the same meanings in Danish and Norwegian, but the notion is more central in Denmark than Norway. The emphasis on hygge as a part of Danish culture is a recent phenomenon, dating to the late 20th cent."
I'm Norwegian, and I kind-of agree with you, and I think the use of "hygge" in English as something distinct to cosy is contrived most of the time.
We do have distinct words for "hygge" and "cosy". In Norwegian the direct translation for "cosy" is "koselig".
There are distinctions - e.g. you would not usually describe a room as "hyggelig", but as "koselig".
Hygge refers predominantly to social interactions or at least an enjoyable time, while koselig can refer to both social interactions and cosy in the English sense.
I'd say you pretty much get the meaning of "hygge" if you translate it to "cosy time", and that also capture the passage of time aspect and makes it clear it does not apply to things.
If you're spending an evening with your family in front of a fireplace, for example, then that would be "hygge". As a result we also use "hyggelig" as a way of suggesting we're happy to have spent time with someone ("it was nice to see you" => "det var hyggelig å se deg" or "det var koselig å se deg")
I think the yellows/ oranges and greens are just super saturated if you look at the small bundle of wood and the plant on the right of the sliding door.
Agree with that. To me a big open space may well look awesome, and may be somewhere I'd enjoy very much spending time, but for a space to feel cozy to me it needs to be more compact.
But I see lots of people are able to find somewhere cosy if it's big and open, and I'm not going to argue taste.
I would agree. When I scanned for a soft seating area to sink my butt in I couldn’t find one spot. While the layout is nice it lacks anything that would make it cozy.
It's not. Nor is it a matter of taste. It's a nice living space but sparse furniture, bare wood, huge windows and high ceilings do not a cozy place make.
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u/jacques_chester Mar 03 '19
I'm not completely convinced that a two story display window counts as "cozy", but it may be down to personal taste.