Stockholm City Hall

On the eastern tip of the island of Kungsholmen, where the water of Lake Mälaren opens into the bay of Riddarfjärden, Stockholm City Hall rises straight out of the shoreline in dark red brick. Its square tower, 106 metres high, is crowned by the Three Crowns, the national emblem of Sweden, and from the water the whole building looks less like an office of local government than like a palace on a lagoon. That impression is intended: its architect, Ragnar Östberg, mixed a massive, austere Northern brick architecture with echoes of Venetian Gothic, and the result became the best-known monument of Swedish National Romanticism.

The city council decided in 1907 to build a new city hall on the site of a former mill, Eldkvarn. Construction took twelve years, from 1911 to 1923, and the building was inaugurated on 23 June 1923, a date chosen as what was then taken to be the 400th anniversary of Gustav Vasa's entry into Stockholm. Nearly eight million red bricks of the traditional large format known as monk's brick were used. At the foot of the tower stands a cenotaph for Birger Jarl, the 13th-century statesman traditionally regarded as Stockholm's founder, and the tower can be climbed by lift or by a staircase of 365 steps.

The great halls inside are as famous as the exterior. The Blue Hall, where the banquet follows the Nobel Prize ceremony each December, is not blue at all: the name survives from Östberg's first draft, and the brick walls were left bare. Above it, the Golden Hall is lined with mosaics of more than 18 million glass and gold tiles depicting scenes from Swedish history, executed by the Berlin firm of Puhl & Wagner. The building remains the seat of Stockholm's municipal council.

Getting there

The City Hall stands on Kungsholmen in central Stockholm, a short walk from Stockholm Central Station. The nearest airport is Stockholm Bromma Airport (BMA), about 7 km away; the main international airport, Stockholm Arlanda (ARN), lies about 37 km to the north.