Royal Palace staff ready themselves for Nobel Prize dinner guests in King Karl XI’s Gallery in the State Apartments. Architect Nicodemus Tessin the Younger modeled the gallery on Versailles’s Hall of Mirrors, including the ceiling paintings featuring ancient gods and goddesses that glorify the king’s reign. Alexis Daflos/Kungl. Hovstaterna
Since the 13th century, Swedish monarchs have called the Royal Palace in Stockholm home.
Baroque architect Nicodemus Tessin the Younger designed the current 600-room, Roman-style palace after a fire destroyed the previous structure in 1697. When Tessin died, architect Carl Harleman completed the structure.
Tessin’s Royal Palace design exemplifies the Tessin Gold Baroque style. The Tessin style includes the essentials of the baroque style with its rich ornamentation and symmetrical design elements (particularly s-shaped curves in art and furniture designs) but with French and Italian influences, not seen in Sweden’s baroque style before. Prior to Tessin, Northern European art and architecture had informed Sweden’s early-baroque style (Caroline Period).
Having studied in Italy and France, Tessin counted some of France’s great artists and architects—Charles Le Brun, Jean Bérain, and André Le Nôtre, to name a few—among his friends. And in Italy, he studied under Gian Lorenzo Bernini and his pupil Carlo Fontana. Their influence on Tessin’s work can be seen throughout the bricks, mortar, and decorative works of this bastion of Swedish architecture.
Nicodemus Tessin the Younger's imposing brick and sandstone Royal Palace in Stockholm blends French, Italian, and Swedish baroque styles, making it a fine example of the Tessin Gold Baroque style. The palace's State Apartment, topped with a balustrade, faces the city, and the smaller living rooms look out onto an inner courtyard that Tessin based on the Louvre Museum's courtyard in Paris. Maykova Galina/Shutterstock
In Tessin’s time, King Louis XIV and the Palace of Versailles’s courtly ceremonial style ruled European royal etiquette. Tessin based the Royal Palace on the practical design of Versailles, keeping the royal apartments, the royal chapel, and the buildings of the country’s administration in close proximity. He also copied some of the French palace’s interiors, notably mimicking the Hall of Mirrors in his design for Karl XI’s Gallery.
In the guest apartments, visitors can see the 18th-century decorative style, adorned with Swedish furniture, mostly made in Stockholm during the 18th and 19th centuries.
Tessin’s Royal Palace demonstrates the architect’s skill of blending several European styles while staying true to the harmony and abundance that defines the baroque style.
Architect Nicodemus Tessin the Younger ensured that every architectural element of the palace’s south façade, which faces the city, conveyed the greatness of Sweden. Elegant Corinthian columns stretch to the heavens, sculptures of great Swedish men stand in the niches, and Sweden’s coat of arms hangs over the doorway that frames the entrance like an ancient triumphal arch. The doorway leads to the Royal Chapel and the Hall of State, perhaps reminding those who enter that from faith comes good governance. Per-Boge//Shutterstock
Since the 1200s, devout royals have been able to pray in the palace chapel. The current chapel dates from the mid-1700s, after the fire of 1697. Architect Carl Harleman finished the crisp white and gilded interior decoration based on Nicodemus Tessin the Younger’s drawings. Alexis Daflos/Kungl. Hovstaterna
In the Hall of State, under Sweden’s coat of arms, Queen Kristina’s silver coronation throne takes center stage. Sweden’s monarchs have been crowned on the throne since 1650. Hakan Lind/Kungl. Hovstaterna
Symbols of Sweden cover Queen Kristina’s silver throne. The silver used on the throne had the same significance as white in the Christian tradition, representing purity, innocence, and perfection. Atop the throne, personifications of justice and wisdom flank two angels holding up a laurel wreath topped with a crown. Each monarch who sits on the throne rests his or her back, and heart, on Sweden’s national emblem: the three crowns. Alexis Daflos/Kungl. Hovstaterna
The king still meets with members of the Swedish government in the Cabinet Room of the Royal Palace. Mirrors and rich tapestries line the gilded walls of what was once Gustav III’s dining room. Ungvari Attila/Shutterstock
The sumptuous interior of Oskar II’s Writing Room with its parquet floor, harmonious landscape paintings, and sienna furnishings must have inspired the former king who, as a lover of music and literature, composed prose, music, and poetry. His writing won him great acclaim. Alexis Daflos/Kungl. Hovstaterna
More than 200 sculptures stand among the stone doric columns in Gustav III’s Museum of Antiquities. The museum opened in 1794 to house the king’s impressive collection, and the sculptures are displayed exactly as they were then. Alexis Daflos/Kungl. Hovstaterna
Lorraine Ferrier
Author
Lorraine Ferrier writes about fine arts and craftsmanship for The Epoch Times. She focuses on artists and artisans, primarily in North America and Europe, who imbue their works with beauty and traditional values. She's especially interested in giving a voice to the rare and lesser-known arts and crafts, in the hope that we can preserve our traditional art heritage. She lives and writes in a London suburb, in England.
