In the pantheon of the Swedish monarchs, King Oscar I (1844-1859) barely qualifies a mention. An early reformer, the second Bernadotte lost the nerve in the cross currents of the revolutionary uprisings of the time. After his death, his widow queen Josefina erected, in his honor, a home for poor women of the upper class, often widows without money. Designed by the architect Per Ulrik Stenhammar and built between 1873 and 1875, the beautiful three -story structure with two wings in front of a central courtyard was one of the first buildings in Stockholm that opened rooms with long corridors illuminated by arched windows. Charitable but in no miserable way, the home in the avant -garde of the southern district of Södermalm de Stockolm provided comfort for almost 80 years.
But after the elderly residents moved in the early 1950s, the majestic building suffered decades of vicissitudes. Located directly at the top of a new rail tunnel, it was empty for years, not precisely not loved, but run over and apparently stranded in a grid of steel beams that protect their foundations from the earth movements underneath. Finally, the works were completed, and the city was ready to sell the building, but in the condition that it became a public space.
Therefore, historical property has been reborn as a 32 -room hotel and suite, its elaborate metal roof with rounded bedroom windows characteristics again, and its reputed plaster facade in its original sandstone color. In the eardrum on the elegant main entrance, the original golden letters spell their previous name: Konung Oscar I: S Minne (Memory of King Oscar I). Below is the new building: Stockholm Stadshotell.
In English it means “Hotel de la Ciudad”, but for a Swede, Statshotell It evokes something more romantic: a certain nostalgia, a bourgeois elegance. It also indicates what type of establishment is this; So much so that when the fiercely local residents of Södermalm learned the name, they felt relieved. They feared that their precious building became an exclusive destination hotel largely closed to its neighbors; Instead, they obtained a contemporary version of the family inns that dot the country: social centers, or statts As they are colloquially known.
“He STATT It is where you go to your first date, where you take grandmother for your 70th birthday. It is the living room for the city, “he says Fredrik CarlströmA creative director who is one of the five founding partners of the hotel. Swede, based in New York, which develops brands and real estate, is fascinated with the art of the environment. “In hotels and real estate there is this trend of who designed it, who is the architect, but I think that people who really are excellent to create an environment are restorers.” For a long time he wondered what would happen if a hotel were managed by a cohort of the best of them, applying all their knowledge of hospitality to all the experience of guests: “Put people first and let the design continue as a backdrop,” as he says.
With this STATT Carlström is putting that theory into practice, having associated with Johan Agregl, Jon Lacotte and Dan Källström, the trio behind the very collected of the neighborhood. Babeta, Nizza coffee, Sentimental music and TENGUA. They did not have to go far to meet: Carlström had been hanging out in their restaurants for years, absorbing their special sauce. “I visit every time I come from New York. Babette feels especially like a high -end cafeteria at an art university.” In 2020, when Agree told him about a wonderful heritage building in the heart of Söder (as the locals call him) that he had put for rent and would be the perfect hotel, Carlström sold instantly. Recruited his friend and colleague Ian NicholsonA veteran manager and developer of the American hotel whose CV includes the standard, the Mercer, Chateau MarmontHudson and Soho Grand Hotels. His financial partner, Karl-Johan Person, the third generation to direct the Swedish retail giant H&M (and a regular babette), also needed little persuasion.
The summary was succinct: a house where you can eat and sleep, but where the approach is turned. “A restaurant with rooms instead of a hotel, which must provide a place for breakfast,” says Agrell, and adds that opening the bistist before the hotel, as they did in December, stressed its particular difference. Although the hotel name may not mean anything for non -nonsense, he says he points out what they want to achieve. “It is like anti-aenga in a way. Stockholm Stadshelll is very institutional, which helps send a message that it is the product, it is food, it is wine, it is the service, it is inclusion; that is what we want.”
Everything continues from there. Even the nomenclature is simple, if not prosaic: there is bistro, with tiles on the walls, tables screwed to the floor and a daily manuscript slate menu; SALONGEN, with SMåland sidewalks and chairs; the bar; and the high -end restaurant, Matsalen, “dining room” in Swedish. Like the home, where you eat in the kitchen every day and use the Matsalen For special occasions. Quite special, in this case: Matsalen is in the old chapel, complete with vaulted roofs, ionic pilasters, golden angels and recently repaired marble walls. The staff can make the formality of good food, folding napkins in the Bishop hats, for example, but this is not a silent temple. The tasting menu is five generous courses, no 15, created under the administration of the executive chef and student of Chez Panisse OLLE CELLTONand served without a fuss or ego.
The hotel design, lobby, rooms and rooms, was supervised by Elin Martin and Michaela Hemlin of Study Escopistand align with this mentality. A demanding luxury where nothing shouts, and everything is comfortable and beautiful without being overloaded; Carlström calls it alternately “Shaker Chic” and “Monastic Meets Palazzo”. There are discreet winks to the history of Swedish design, from the infected and Swedish grace of Biedermeier to the functionalism of the 1940s and 50 Forest cemeterywidely recognized as the most photogenic bank of Stockholm). Vintage findings are combined with custom furniture in rich wood, such as birch birch, and upholstered in dense velvet.
Thanks to the building itself, there is a lot of inherent character, an old energy and humanity that is still very noticeable, even if much of the current interior was built from scratch. There are 150 years of rolling band brands on limestone steps on two original curved stairs, and the funny corridors protected by heritage, with their lines of vision to large windows, which in many of these projects would have been absorbed in larger hotel rooms. A sensation of art and crafts, from the Marquetía de Intarsia that captures the reasons for Stockholm in the elevator to the traditional Väveri woven napkins.
Södermalm is in itself a special place; For now, Gentrified, but even with a working sand, the Creative Self -Demined Locus of the city: the Brooklyn of Stockholm, so to speak, whose residents prefer to socialize in their hood, says Agrell. It is not presumptuous enough to suggest that he and his partners have created a very necessary social center, but it is “super prolonged” if others say it. (They are). They are the first days, but there is a feeling of a life beyond the insularity of a luxury hotel, a spirit of the neighborhood in which a stranger can share. Lacotte, a proud place from Söder who grew up at the nearby utilitarian station, cannot wait for summer, when he and his crew will turn the patio into an Italian -style square with chairs and umbrellas, and the doors will really open.
stockholmstadshotell.comof SKR3,500 (around € 325)