(Exhibition text in English, referring to a QR code in the exhibition)
They used to be called servants. In the 1920s, the job title hembiträde (English: maid, but the literal translation is ‘home assistant’) rises in popularity. Young women from the countryside move to towns and cities for work. Around 20 % of all unmarried women in Sweden work in someone else’s home.
Despite this, the shortage of cheap household staff, the so-called ‘servant crisis’, becomes a topic of discussion among the bourgeoisie during the interwar period. In the cities, there are other jobs available to uneducated women. Unregulated working hours, low status and lack of personal freedom makes domestic work less attractive.