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Maria Magdalena Kyrka
Consecrated in 1643, Södermalm's oldest church stands on the site of a 14th-century chapel, torn down by serial church trasher Gustav Vasa after the Reformation of 1527. Although fire destroyed much of the current building in 1759, it was faithfully re-built, including the transept designed by Nicodemus Tessin the Elder and a beautiful stone entrance portal by Tessin the Younger.
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Moderna Museet
Moderna Museet turns the big 5-0 in 2008 and museum director Lars Nittve is bumping up the booty to celebrate. Check out new stuff like photographer Tova Mozard's David Lynch-esque photography, as well as 20th-century classics like the buxom outdoor sculptures by Jean Tinguely and Niki de Saint Phalle.
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National Museum
Sweden's largest art museum heaves with painting, sculpture, drawings, decorative arts and graphics from the Middle-Ages through to the present. While there's no lack of continental bigwigs here, from Cézanne to Watteau, come for the Scandi stuff, which includes works by CG Pilo, Anders Zorn and Carl Larsson, whose commissioned staircase fresco, Midwinter Sacrifice, was originally rejected by the museum. Style buffs shouldn't miss the Design 19002000 exhibition.
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Nobelmuseet
More about ideas and inspiration than artefacts, the minimalist Nobelmuseet features some fascinating short films on 'creativity', an audio archive of acceptance speeches, interviews with and readings from laureates like Martin Luther King and Ernest Hemingway, and café chairs signed by the visiting prize winners (turn them over to see!). To get the most out of the museum, join a free guided tour.
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Nordiska Museet
With its flouncy turrets and neo-Swedish Renaissance looks, Isak Gustav Clason's iconic building is hard to miss. Step inside for a sprawling collection of all things Swedish, from Sami folklore to eclectic exhibitions of Swedish fashion, shoes, interiors and even table settings. The museum owns the largest collection of paintings by August Strindberg and the audio tours ( Sk20 ) of the collection and building are nothing short of satisfying.
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Östasiatiska Museet
Know your Buddha from your bodhisattvas at Stockholm's Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, famed for its world-class booty of ancient Eastern art, stoneware and porcelain. Particularly noteworthy is the collection of wares from the Chinese dynasties of Song, Ming and Qing, as well as the museum's fresh temporary shows, which cover anything from comic-book manga to the art of Japanese tattoos.
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Östermalms Saluhall
Stockholm's market diva, Östermalms Saluhall is a must-see mix of 1880s architecture, heady aromas, gorgeous stalls and old-fashioned neighbourly hobnobbing. Lust over lobsters, pig-out on salmon pudding and get the low-down on Swedish gourmet from the veteran market vendors.
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Postmuseum
While a museum dedicated to almost four centuries of Swedish postal history sounds positively mind-numbing, Stockholm's Post Museum is surprisingly engrossing, crammed with old mail carriages, a climb-aboard train carriage, offbeat postcards and a cute children's post office downstairs for budding postal workers. Previous temporary exhibitions have covered everything from the life of the Great Garbo to the kiss in art.
And, of course, you can mail letters, send packages and buy stamps here.
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Prins Eugens Waldemarsudde
Dubbed 'the painter prince', Prins Eugens (1865-1947) once lived at this waterside villa. The property now houses the late prince's superlative collection of Nordic art, including works by Anders Zorn, Carl Larsson and Isaac Grünewald, as well as landscape paintings by the reclusive royal himself. The terraced garden boasts sculptures by Carl Milles and Auguste Rodin, sublimely matched by cool water-views and an 18th-century windmill.
The villa was designed by Ferdinand Boberg, creator of the NK department store.
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Riddarholmskyrkan
With its dramatic iron spire stabbing at the sky, Riddarholmskyrkan (on Riddarholmen) is a Stockholm icon. Built by Franciscan monks in the late 13th century and expanded in the mid-15th century, it has been the final resting place of Swedish monarchs since the burial of the mighty Gustav II Adolf in 1632, whose marble sarcophagus lies in the Gustavian chapel.
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Riddarhuset
Admirers of architecture shouldn't miss this 17th-century Dutch Baroque masterpiece, designed by Simon de la Vallée, Heinrich Wilhelm, Joost Vingboons and Jean de la Vallée. Used by the Swedish parliament between 1641 and 1674, it still hosts the triennial Assembly of Nobles. Highlights include the chancellery, which houses some 300 pieces of heraldic porcelain, and the Great Hall, plastered with 2345 coats of arms belonging to Swedish nobility.
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Riksdagshuset
It mightn't sound like the most exciting way to spend an hour, but tours of Sweden's parliament building are actually fascinating, taking in art works by Otte Sköld and Axel Törneman, as well as Elisabet Hasselberg Olsson's Memory of a Landscape, a 54 sq m, 100kg tapestry woven in 200 shades of grey. The rather dreamy Swedish system of consensus-building, as presented by clued-up guides, has been known to elicit chuckles of disbelief.
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Skansen
Skansen, the world's first open-air museum, was founded in 1891 by Artur Hazelius to let visitors see how Swedes lived in previous times.
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Spårvägsmuseet
Board a 1938 bus, hop on a retro metro carriage, or create your own computer-generated public transit network at this surprisingly cool transport museum. This former bus depot is also home to toy museum Leksaksmuseet (641 61 00; www.leksaksmuseet.se), an oversized fantasy nursery packed with everything you probably ever wanted as a child (and may still hanker after as an adult).
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St Jakobs Kyrka
Rising beside legendary opera house bistro Bakfickan, this sorbet-hued church sits in the cosiest pocket of Norrmalm (picture bicycles, cobblestones and a continental vibe). Completed in 1643, the building features both Renaissance and Gothic architecture with a magnificent vaulted ceiling, an ornate pulpit (1828), high altarpiece (1937) and elaborate southern entrance.
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Stadsbiblioteket
Designed by Erik Gunnar Asplund in 1924, the Stockholm Public Library is one of Sweden's architectural masterpieces. A classic example of Nordic neo-classicism, its piece de resistance is the breathtakingly beautiful cylindrical lending hall with its Technicolor panorama of books. Add artwork by Ivar Johnson in the vestibule and Nils Dardel in the children's library and you have yourself an unmissable Scandi treat.
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Stadshuset
Built in the National Romantic style using eight million bricks and completed in 1923, Stockholm's iconic City Hall is home of the Nobel Banquet. The Golden Hall is a glittering spectacle made with 10kg of gold and 68 million mosaic pieces. Tours of the building are fascinating, while a soulful chill on the waterside terrace (the sculptures here are by Carl Eldh) is free. For breathtaking view, head to the top of the hulking tower.
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Stockholms Stadsmuseum
Inside a former dungeon, a time-line exhibition traces Stockholm's development from fortified port to modern metropolis via plague, fire and good old-fashioned scandal. You can smell medieval potions, peek into an 18th-century tavern and lust at the legendary Lohe Treasure, 20kg of 18th-century silver discovered in 1937. Great temporary exhibitions range from Johan Hagelbäck's 'Raisin Art' to the culture of death in Stockholm.
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Storkyrkan
One-time venue of royal weddings and coronations, Stockholm's 700-year-old cathedral is also its oldest parish church. The Gothic-cum-baroque interior includes extravagant royal-box pews designed by Nicodemus Tessin the Younger and the famous Parhelion Painting, a 1630 copy of the earlier original depicting Stockholm during an eerie display of atmospheric optics in 1535. The star is German Berndt Notke's sculpture St George and the Dragon.
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Strindbergsmuseet
Set inside the Blå Tornet apartment where August Strindberg spent his final four years, the Strindberg Museum lets you peep into his closet, scan his bookshelves and stumble across his desk, which still bears his pens, spectacles, theatrical programme sheets and a copy of his Ockulta Dagboken (The Occult Diary, 1896-1908). The museum organises Strindberg-themed readings and seminars (occasionally in English, contact the museum).
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Svensk Form
Stockholm's foremost design centre features temporary exhibitions of cutting-edge industrial design and applied arts, a Swedish design library and archive, as well as a cool little design shop and café, complete with copies of in-house design magazine Form . On Wednesday evenings, designers (and the design-inclined) drop in for a drink, a schmooze and regular design seminars.
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Tekniska Museet
The latest draw card at the vast and vibrant Museum of Science and Technology is CINO4, Sweden's first 4-D cinema. Once you've been shaken, stirred and possibly squirted, check out the rest of this dazzling multimedia complex, which includes chatty Japanese robots, Sweden's first motor car (from 1897), an artificial mine, retro telephone collection and the Teknorama Science Centre, with its interactive displays on a range of topics.
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Thielska Galleriet
Scandi art fans come for Anders Zorn's portraits and nudes, Carl Larsson's portraits, Bruno Liljefors' precisely rendered wildlife paintings, August Strindberg's wild landscapes, and Edvard Munch's paintings and sketches, including an enormous portrait of Strindberg and one of the collection's former owner, tycoon Ernest Thiel. Originally Thiel's home, this island mansion was designed by Ferdinand Boberg, designer of Prins Eugens Waldemarsudde.
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Tullmuseet
Despite the patchy availability of English-language information, the Customs Museum is worth a snoop for its rather revealing exhibition on the 'art' of smuggling, which includes a pair of spacious knickers used to smuggle alcohol in the 1920s. Crack-stuffed sneakers aside, there's also a reconstruction of a 1920s customs warehouse and lab with eerily real mannequins.
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Tyska Kyrkan
A reminder of days of the Hanseatic League, when Stockholm and Germany shared tight trade links, the beautiful Tyska Kyrkan (the German Church) dates from the 1570s but was enlarged to its current size between 1638 and 1642. Highlights include a gilded royal gallery historically used for members of the royal German family, royal pews by Nicodemus Tessin the Elder, 119 unique gallery paintings (1660-65) and an ebony and alabaster pulpit (1660).
