Quirky historical sites in Stockholm?

These are some places I can think of that don’t attract the typical first time visitor to Stockholm.

The Hallwylska Museum is a place that doesn’t get too many foreign visitors. It is a turn of the century house right in the center of Stockholm.

Prince Eugens Waldemarsudde is another historic home in a beautiful setting on Djurgården. If you go there and the weather is nice, head to Rosendals Trädgårdskafe for lunch before or after your visit; it is a cafe set in an apple orchard that serves nice organic salads, sandwiches, and baked goods.

I really like Millesgården. It is the home of the sculptor Carl Milles and the garden has his really fantastic sculptures.

The following places are all well known, but not on the list of places you have visited.
You might also consider the Stockholm City Hall, the Tekniska Museum, and the Nordiska Museum depending on your interests.

It’s not quirky but we absolutely loved the Stockholm City Hall. We did a tour which was very helpful. It sits in a lovely spot overlooking the water. If photography interests you there is also an interesting museum in the Sodermalm area; we enjoyed it and I believe we had a nice lunch there too.

You have recieved some great answers so far, but I have a few more suggestions. I you enjoyed the Mediterranean museum, it has three "sister museums" that you might enjoy as well, and two of them are in Stockholm, the East Asian museum and the museum of Etnography. (There is also the World Culture museum in Gothenburg.)

Other interesting museum that are outside the busiest tourist paths are:

• The Butterfly house, https://en.fjarilshuset.se A bit outside the city centre though, but easy to reach by public transportation. And if you go there, make sure to visit the nearby Copper Tents as well.
• The Stockholm Transport Museum, on the history of the public transportation in Stockholm. https://sparvagsmuseet.se/in-english/
• The Museum of Science and Technology: https://www.tekniskamuseet.se/en/
• The Army Museum: https://armemuseum.se/en/start/
• Vrak, the shipwreck museum: https://www.vrak.se
• The Jewish museum: https://judiskamuseet.se/?lang=en
• The Museum of Performing Arts: www.scenkonstmuseet.se
• Almgren silk factory and museum: https://www.kasiden.se/en/

And if you're willing to visit some less quirky museums there is also the Nordic museum, https://www.nordiskamuseet.se/en/ and the National museum, https://www.nationalmuseum.se/en/ I don't know how you define "not too far away" but there are many other options within easy reach from central Stockholm.

It's not so secret, but have you already toured the Drottningholm Court Theater? There are only three such authentic old theaters left in Europe. Pretty river trip, too.

I won't discuss Sweden specifically, but Atlas Obscura website gives obscure/quirky recommendations. You can search for a specific city or region.

Thanks everyone, these are all great! Shame I only have one afternoon this time, but I will keep the rest in the back pocket until the next I'm in Stockholm. Currently leaning towards the Armémuseum, looks right up my alley :)

Forgot to mention I was also in the Stockholm City Hall and also enjoyed it!

I think you will have a nice afternoon, no matter what museum you choose. And for a future trip, keep in mind that there are many amazing museums within day trip distance from Stockholm as well.

Tomorrow my wife and I are headed to Skansen, the oldest open-air museum in the world. It's very near central Stockholm; almost walkable from the Gamla Stan. I'll try to post a brief review here after we're done. We plan to spend the entire day there.

Well, jphbucks, perhaps I will see you there. I have my ticket in hand! (Well, on my phone, actually.)

Have fun both of you! It almost make me wish I would be in Stockholm tomorrow.

Skansen is a great museum and well worth a visit. Although you can walk there from Gamla stan, my suggestion is to take the ferry from Slussen.

I read about taking the ferry, and wanted to, but not really efficient from my hotel on Strandvagen.

No, if you're staying at Strandvägen the easiest way to get to Skansen is to take the tram or just walk.

But if you want to take the ferry you can take route 80 instead, it leaves from Nybroviken, the bay outside your hotel. See the map here: https://sl.se/contentassets/03df56ce34df4a0b9cb6543866a81c50/pendelbatslinje80-april2024.png It's not too frequent, but runs more or less twice an hour.

Was Skansen a great place? Unequivocally yes! We took the #80 ferry from the dock at Saltsjöqvarn (a 15-minute walk from our AirBnB in the Sofia district) to the busy Djurgårdsslätten, where the Vasa (loved it!) and ABBA (didn't bother; hate their music) museums are. Also the Tivoli amusement park, which has some really impressive roller coasters. The ferry ride is brief but very scenic, and it costs no more than a bus ride.

Skansen has many parts. The Nordic Animals area is effectively a zoo focusing on animals of northern Europe, including brown bears, moose, reindeer, European bison, wild boar and lynx. We saw bears frolicking in a water pool, an absolutely priceless experience. In another area, Swedish farm animals are on display in a typical meadow setting. Historical farm buildings are available to tour. A Sami ("Laplander") settlement is shown.

Other Skansen exhibits include typical 19th and 20th century village stores, residences and even industrial shops, including active glass blowing and pottery operations. There's a full aquarium. We ate reindeer burgers for lunch. Incredible; we spent 8 hours there and loved every minute. Strongly recommended.

Wanted to circle back to give an update, was able to do quite a bit this afternoon. Went first to see the Hallwyl House as recommended, very interesting to see Mrs. Hallwyl was a avid collector of 17th century arms and armor as well as Dutch paintings, good taste. I liked seeing the first modern bathroom in Sweden, not so different from our own. Took me about 1.5 hr to see.

After ate at Restaurang Prinsen, very classic establishment, reminds me of the Brasseries you find in Paris, good ambiance. I had Mjukbakad Kalventrcôte, a kind of veal steak, The food itself was ok, correct but uninspiring. The waiters were very good and professional, like was more abundant in the Europe of yesteryear.

After it was a 10 min walk to the Swedish Army Museum, set in a very impressive artillery school I believe. The museum collection itself was very extensive and exhausting lol, I think maybe too much for the casual tourist. But all very well done with a lot of great expositions from the 1500s to the present where you could actual handle some of the artifacts. I did appreciate they tried to look at war more from a societal perspective rather than just glorification. Unfortunately the gift shop was a let down, not a lot on offer. I like to collect uniform patches of military units from around the world and they had zero of them in the Swedish Army Museum. Took me about 2.5 hrs but I skipped though some parts.

Mrs. Hallwyl was a avid collector

She sure was! She had a lot of table settings and tea sets!!

I enjoyed Prinzen, probably the day before you. And further to a discussion about solo travelers going to dinner alone, I couldn't tell if the manager was annoyed, but the staff were very welcoming and attentive. It probably didn't hurt that there were empty tables. And I did a pretty good job of ordering lots of food!!

Thanks for the update! It sounds like you had a nice day. I hope you enjoyed the food, but Prinsen is not the place to go to for modern inspiring food, their niche is very much traditional Swedish cooking and not inventing too much. But a great place for meatballs.

Regarding Skansen, it is a nice place to visit. The nordic farm animal section is not just for display, they also do a valuable work keeping landraces alive. But Skansen is more than animals, they also have a huge collection of older buildings from all over Sweden. And when you visit those buildings, think about the effort needed to move all those buildings long distances in the late 1800s.

Just circling back to report I had a terrible dinner at Kvarnen tonight in Stockholm, a supposedly traditional Swedish restaurant. The restaurant is recommended by Rick Steves and I think actually his Scandinavia tour eats there. I think this is probably the worst meal i had in Sweden, the entire year that I've been living here.

First the whole restaurant was filled with foreigners, I didn't hear Swedish once, mainly rowdy Americans. I was with some friends from Spain and we ordered a cured meat tray to start, you can imagine our surprise when we were served Spanish cured meats, like Jamon and Salchichón serve to us, all terrible quality.

Later we ordered the reindeer stew on the recommendation of the waiter. I've had reindeer before in Sweden and it wasn't too bad, however this reindeer stew was little pieces of reindeer very tough and very tasteless, almost inedible like leather, smothered in some kind of heavy cream sauce. It also was very hot at the bottom of the dish while the food on the top was room temperature, which indicated to me it was probably microwaved. Let's just say the meal did not agree with me afterwards and I'm sitting here now with a stomach ache, not sure what exactly it was, but it was definitely something that I ate.

Just to reiterate don't go to Kvarnen, a total tourist trap, and pretty expensive too.

I'm sorry to hear that, Kvarnen has had a pretty decent reputation but it sounds like things have gone downhill. Although I hope it was just a temporary problem.

Cured meat is not that traditional Swedish, so I'm not surprised that you were served Spanish meats. But they should not serve you meats of terrible quality. They do have some more traditional Swedish entrées on the menu though, like SOS, Toast Pelle Janzon or Gubbröra. On their menu the stews is called ren- och viltskavspanna, and skav usually means small pieces of meat, it's thinly sliced frozen meat. Although ren- och viltskav means that is reindeer mixed with other meat (probably because it's cheaper).

And you feel that your stomach ache was caused by the restaurant you really should let the city know! Details: https://start.stockholm/kontakta-oss/livsmedelskollen/

Thanks badger once again for demystifying Sweden for me haha!

I'm currently with friends now in Visby in Gotland and we are having a great time, I think this is probably the best travel experience I've had in Sweden so far, and the food has all been delicious!

And thanks Carlos once again for showing me my home country from a new point of view!

Glad to hear you are enjoying Visby, it is a lovely town in many ways.

(Also, make sure you try some saffranspannkaka before you leave Gotland.)