My mother’s great hero was the Danish thinker and social critic Poul Henningsen with his progressive, liberal ideas. She was also enthusiastic about his mother, Agnes Henningsen, who had an advice column. After my mother died, I found a letter she had sent to the column shortly after I was born. In it, she wrote that she – like Agnes Henningsen herself – had had a child out of wedlock and asked for advice on whether this should be revealed or kept secret.

PH’s grand piano was revolutionary in its use of materials: aluminium and plastic and things like that.