In Efva Attling's new book there is a letter from the famous American model mother Eileen Ford, posted in May 1972. The letter begins with a few polite phrases and ends with these lines:
"I hope you'll lose weight over the summer while you're traveling, so everything will work out by the fall. I sure hope so."
- Do you know how thin I was? says Efva Attling, remembering herself as a 20-year-old.
At the time, however, she was not called Efva, but was called "Natasha" as a model so as not to be confused with any of the other Swedish Eves who worked for the agency. I flip back to the page several times and skim over the wording. You yourself would have had an eating disorder for less, but the insensitive comments from the modeling industry's most powerful madam do not seem to have caused any deeper wounds in the recipient.
- I knew how to trick her then. When we met later in Milan, where Eileen Ford traveled to scout new faces, I put on a black dress. "See how much weight I've lost?" and she replied: "Yes, Efva, it's perfect!", she says and continues:
- But it wasn't about me being overweight anywhere. It was just a mantra she repeated. And it was terrible, but I saw through that pretty quickly. She also told me I "walked like a cowboy". But I answered: yes, but this is how I go". I just: uh!" says Efva Attling and shrugs.
Soon the music beckoned. Efva Attling started writing songs, took a picture with a guitar she borrowed from then-husband Niklas Strömstedt and advertised for bandmates in the Pet Sounds record store in Stockholm. Against Abba-Benny's recommendation, it must be said. After he heard an early song by Attling, he suggested that she pursue modeling instead, as she had a much better command of it.
Some time later, however, the band X Models was formed and in 1981 they had a smash hit with the song "Två av oss". It is also from that particular single that she borrowed a line for the book's title: "There is only one of me". It is not a traditional biography, but more like a photo album crossed with a kind of memory bank with shorter texts and highlights of major life events.
- I've been asked the question so many times. Aren't you going to write a biography? I've said I'm too young. Then I heard that Britney Spears wrote her first book when she was 17. But now that I've waited so long, I really wanted to do it my way. My life is so much pictures, so I wanted a lot of photos in the book, she says, looking at the black and white book cover on the table next to her.
- I brought in my wife as editor. We had a lot of fun working on the book together. After all, Eva has written several books and has the gift of words on paper more than I do. I have written lyrics and music, but not a book. After all, I enjoy being in front of the camera, and am more used to conveying a feeling without speaking.
See you at her bright office on Södermalm in Stockholm. On the wall hangs a photo of Efva Attling together with Crown Princess Victoria and in a corner there is a purple lounge chair that she reveals that she sometimes takes a nap in. She affectionately calls the staff "attlings". We are shown to the studio.
- I have put a new old anvil in my place. Now we're going to bank! she says, walking away with the hammer on a silver bar that will eventually become a bracelet.
- Did you know that the more you hammer on silver, the harder it gets? Therefore, you have to anneal it sometimes.
For thirty years, her jewelry has glimmered around countless fingers, wrists and necks. After the first five years as a jewelry designer, she celebrated her success by treating herself to a Birkin bag from the luxury brand Hermès. It is now leaning against a drawer in her office.
In the book, the 74-year-old describes his journey as an apprentice with a silversmith to becoming a jewelry designer and then an entrepreneur. Beyond the success story and funny anecdotes from party nights and meetings with stars like Grace Jones and Paul McCartney, there is another side. A serious one. Efva Attling tells about when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and the worries that affected her wife and sons Adam and Simon. But it is also about the loss of the little sister Lena and her son Daniel.
- It was only four years since Lena passed away, so it's very close, she says.
- That part was very difficult to write about, to describe something so sad and get it down so briefly. But I also want to include things that have touched a lot, and my sister and her son have done that, of course. After all, we were five sisters, all with different personalities, and together we became one. We had a lot of fun together. But now that there are four of us, a piece of the puzzle is missing, a link is missing.
The book is also about romantic love and the long relationship with the artist Eva Dahlgren. In 1996 they entered into a registered partnership and the plan was to keep the wedding a secret, but the marriage between Eva and Efva may be one of the most rewritten in Swedish newspaper history. The bills with the new celebrity couple covered all of Sweden for a long time, and even on their honeymoon in Thailand, reporters sat and tried to eavesdrop on them in the hotel's breakfast room.
- It will be like a war. You are being hunted and are trying to find a way out to be able to keep calm. The brain becomes like... she says, making a loud, crackling noise reminiscent of a pepper mill as she brings her palms to her temples.
- But... been there, done that. Now I go into Joe and the juice and there is some girl at the till who has no idea who I am. I order and she asks, "What's your name?" "My name is Eva, but it's spelled Efva." "Huh, what did you say?" It's so fucking nice!
