Stockholm was the last place we visited on our Scandinavian journey. It was a good almost-three-week trip. It spanned the summer solstice, so there was plenty of sunlight. Just look at the color of the sky in these photos – it’s amazing.
There’s a lot of water in Stockholm, as you’d imagine. Which means bridges everywhere.
This is, I think, the parliament building. The steeple on the church in the background is great – an open steel structure. I like that as a way to make the top of a building interesting. I’m keeping it in mind for the palace I will someday build.
This is where the minister stands to deliver the sermon in the German church. It’s not too shabby. (Stockholm was a big trading town back in the day – and each culture had its own church – there’s at least a German Church and a Finnish Church in addition to the Stockholm Cathedral.)
When you build on an island with no cars, you build narrow streets and tall buildings. (This is on Gamla Stan, which is the original island of Stockholm. It’s mostly given over to tourists now.)
This is an actual, named street on Gamla Stan.
A random statue of a boy and his horse. My palace is also going to have a large garden with lots of random statues.
Dragon slaying!
More dragon slaying! It’s the same statue, just different size and colors (obviously). This one is in the Stockholm Medieval Museum – which is both free and super-fascinating.
The smallest statue in Stockholm. Those are normal sized coins. Someone knits hats for it; we were told that it changes about once a week. It’s in the park next to the Finnish church.
I am 90% sure this is a statue of Artemis. But maybe it’s Athena? There’s a small two-room museum off the Royal Palace full of ancient Roman sculpture. (My ancient-loving heart was warmed.)
One of the King Friderics of Sweden. Sweden had more money than Denmark, and thus Stockholm in general is fancier than Copenhagen was. I think this is the Frederick that turned Sweden into that fancier place, with building initiatives and the like.
This is the little symbol over the door that you put up once you paid your dues to the firemen. They’d only put out fires at the houses of the people with the symbol. You’d be surprised at how few there were.
My royal palace is totally going to have a door that looks like this.
Stockholm City Hall. This is where they give out the Nobel prizes every year.
An adorable little lion statue outside City Hall. It could be a nice addition to my palace gardens.
Woo-hoo! This is the oldest park in Stockholm, and, in fact, a number of workers brought their lunches here to escape the dreary offices they work in. The buildings across the canal are hotels and department stores. Pretty fancy for a department store. Maybe I should build one of those instead of a palace….
We initially decided to tour the Swedish Royal Palace because it was hot outside and the stone buildings were nice and cool. But the palace? is also very elegant.
There was a royal wedding in mid-June (this was taken on maybe 1 July?). This hall was where they had the wedding dinner. It was HUGE.
If this room reminds you of the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles, well, it’s supposed to. They borrowed the design from the French.
A trunk from somewhere in the palace. The detail is amazing.
I’ve forgotten exactly where this detail was – over a door? Carved on a wall? Think about living somewhere with this kind of detail – I’d simultaneously love being surrounded by the beauty and be terrified I was going to somehow break it all.
A sitting room.
Another sitting room, but in this one I can imagine Lizzie Bennett and Caroline Bingley taking a turn around the room while Darcy covertly watches them, pretending to write letters.
When I own my palace, I’m going to put artwork in the front hall for everyone to admire.
And this will be the staircase they have to walk up to get to the living area.
This is an incredibly whimsical table layout. If you think it’s a flower, it’s porcelain. All of it. It’s both lovely and funny. And it was all for sale, too.
Your throne, milady.
The palace turned out to be a surprisingly fun detour. I’d recommend it if you’re ever in Stockholm.
