Skansen
The world's oldest open-air museum, with historic Swedish buildings and Nordic animals on Djurgården.
Skansen was founded by the teacher and folklorist Artur Hazelius, who opened it on 11 October 1891 as an outdoor extension of his Nordiska museet. It is the oldest open-air museum in the world and the model for many that followed across Europe. Around 150 buildings have been dismantled at their original sites and re-erected on the hill of Djurgården, among them farmsteads, workshops, a manor house and the wooden Seglora Church of 1730, together forming a picture of Swedish life before industrialisation.
Staff in period dress work the historic houses, demonstrating baking, glassblowing, printing and other crafts, and a town quarter recreates urban trades of the nineteenth century. Skansen is also a zoo devoted mainly to Nordic species such as brown bear, wolf, lynx, wolverine, elk and bison, alongside a collection of native breeds of farm animal. The Baltic Sea Science Center, opened in 2019, presents the ecology of the Baltic. The hill offers wide views over the city and the harbour.
Highlights
- Founded in 1891 by Artur Hazelius, the oldest open-air museum in the world
- Around 150 historic buildings moved here from all over Sweden
- Nordic zoo with bear, wolf, lynx, wolverine, elk and native farm breeds
- Seasonal traditions, from Walpurgis bonfires to the Christmas market
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