If you are stopping by Stockholm, Sweden, take a tour at the City Hall. We had a fantastic experience and I was not expecting this at all when we booked our tour online. The city hall can be seen from very far as this is a very tall building. It was built in 12 years with eight millions bricks. It was inaugurated in 1923.
I personally prefer the indoor part and you will understand why after. All the pictures below were taken during our trip.
Let’s start with the blue hall. This is where the Nobel Prize banquet is held. I am pretty sure you will ask me why is it called the blue hall… if it is all red with bricks. It was supposed to be painted in blue but the architect changed his mind when he saw the bricks. On the first picture, you can see the second largest organ of Scandinavia.
When we continued our visit, we arrived in a room that is dedicated to the meetings of the Municipal Council. The wood ceiling is absolutely stunning and represents the frame of a viking boat. I will let you take a look at all the decorations.
The must of the visit is the golden hall which includes 18 millions golden tiles. It is known as the location of the ball after the annual Nobel Banquet. The mosaics present allegories of events and persons from Swedish history in a byzantine style. The largest wall shows the Queen of Lake Mälar. She holds Stockholm in her lap (the city is located between Lake Mälar and the Batic Sea). We can also find some other motives from different parts of the world like New York or Paris. On the other side, The other wall shows different motifs from all around Stockholm.
The below video provides you some of the experience of this visit. Enjoy!
I just want to end with this… the mix of blue and gold represents well the essence of the swedish roots that are reflected on the swedish flag.
ThinkerSquid 