The preposition av is a very versatile word in Swedish. While it often translates to "of" in English, in this lesson we will focus on two specific everyday uses: describing what objects are made of, and specifying parts of a larger whole.
Made of: Material Composition
When you want to say that an object is made of a certain material, use av followed by the material. You can think of it as saying "made of" or "out of".
This pattern works for all kinds of materials, whether you are talking about clothing—like wool (ull), cotton (bomull), or silk (silke)—or building materials like concrete (betong) and steel (stål).
You can also use this structure to describe a noun directly within a sentence, just like saying "a table of glass" in English:
Parts of a Whole
You also use av to link a specific part, edge, or side to the larger object it belongs to. The pattern is exactly like English:
The part + av + The whole
Use this structure with positional nouns like kanten (the edge), framsidan (the front), or baksidan (the back). Notice that both the part and the whole are usually in their definite forms (e.g., kanten, bordet):