Scandic Hotel Sergel Plaza

Situated just off Sergels Torg, this enormous beast of a hotel caters to upscale business travellers, shoppers and the occasional fan of forbidding Stalinist architecture. It has more than 400 rooms and impeccable (if you're into that sort of thing) 1980s-era decor.

The roofed and carpeted internal courtyard features live piano music of a vintage that, for the most part, precisely mirrors the hotel's decorating scheme. Room rates include one of three types of breakfast buffet - the throngs of business travellers who typically stay here when visiting from Japan have made the Japanese breakfast a surprisingly popular choice. The hotel is close enough to NK and the major retail streets of Drottninggatan and Hamngatan that you can shop yourself silly and not have to worry about lugging all those packages very far.