“He had picked down from about five nests when he had to rest on a tussock. Then he sighed and said, ‘I don’t think I can do this anymore.’ He passed away that autumn,” says Þórunn Lindberg about her late father-in-law, Rögnvaldur Steinsson (1918–2013). At 94, he still visited the eiders at his farm, Hraun á Skaga in North Iceland, and helped as much as he could, collecting and cleaning eiderdown. 

A true family business, the eider sanctuary at Hraun á Skaga was started by Rögnvaldur’s father, Steinn Leó Sveinsson (1886–1957), in 1914. One spring day, he noticed three eiders nesting by the shore and decided to protect them from predators. Through the efforts of Steinn and later those of Rögnvaldur and his wife, Guðlaug, and their descendants, the eider colony grew, and today, the nests number 2,500. 

Every spring, Rögnvaldur’s sons and their families uphold tradition by hanging nets on the fences to keep the foxes out, repairing the wooden shelters where the eiders nest, and, when the time is right, gathering to collect the down. Even the youngest grandchildren help. Today, two of Rögnvaldur’s sons, Steinn and Jóhann, reside at Hraun á Skaga with their families, while his other two sons, Jón and Gunnar, live within a 100 km (60 miles) radius. 

The family has not only maintained the eider duck sanctuary but also expanded the business. After collecting and cleaning the down, they produce high-quality duvets and sell them on their website, hraunaskaga.com.  

“We want to keep everything as local as possible,” informs Merete Rabølle, who is married to Steinn, as she bends over her sewing machine to close the duvet she has stuffed by hand. “The casing was made in Sauðárkrókur.” It’s one of the two nearest towns on Skagi Peninsula, ​60​ km (37 miles) from the farm. Every duvet comes with a quality certificate and is carefully folded in a box featuring the farm’s logo, designed by a visiting artist in Skagaströnd, the neighboring town.  

In addition to being an eider farm, Hraun á Skaga is home to about 400 sheep, 20 horses, a few chickens, and sheep dogs. “We are food producers, too,” remarks Merete. She takes advantage of Vörusmiðjan, a food production facility in Skagaströnd, which was developed for local farmers, to produce cured lamb and pâté.  

Wearing many hats, Steinn also works as a fisherman, operating out of Skagaströnd. Jóhann and his wife Þórunn sell fishing permits for char and trout in the many lakes on Hraun’s land and rent out four remote cabins over the summer. ​​Eider farming is a shared project that brings the whole family together. 

Hraun á Skaga became famous in June 2008 when an intruder was discovered in the eider colony. Merete recounts: “Suddenly, the dog started barking and darted off towards the shore. My daughter ran after it because she knew it wasn’t supposed to go near the eider nests. She saw something white, but, as she wasn’t wearing her glasses, she thought it was a plastic bag. Then it started moving and looked straight at her, and she realized it was a polar bear!” 

The girl escaped to the house, and everyone stayed inside until the police had captured the polar bear, before it managed to cause any damage. The poor creature had probably drifted on icebergs from Greenland before swimming to shore on Skagi.  

Eiderdown season begins as lambing season concludes in May, lasting through June. When the family has collected all the down from the nests on their land, they start the meticulous process of cleaning and washing it. First, the down is dried, then heated in an oven built by Jóhann to disinfect it and make the tangled straw brittle. 

Afterwards, the down is transferred to a machine called krafsari, which removes the straw. The next machine removes feathers from the down. Both were designed and made in Iceland. The last stage before washing is removing all remaining straw and feathers by hand. For hours a day, Merete and Þórunn sit at a table made by their late father-in-law, using a brush and a metal grid —a technique he developed —to carefully clean the eiderdown, taking pride in upholding the family’s legacy. 

A true family business, the eider sanctuary at Hraun á Skaga was started by Rögnvaldur’s father, Steinn Leó Sveinsson, in 1914. One spring day, he noticed three eiders nesting by the shore and decided to protect them from predators.