Long May She Rain : Sweden

The Gothenburg Natural History Museum was founded in 1833 and is the oldest museum in the city. The museum is most famous for its taxidermy blue whale (the only one in the world - which once doubled as a tea room!) and African elephant, but offers a vast array of taxidermy and beautiful dioramas to it's visitors. Needless to say, Bruce was particularly keen to drop by on our trip, but I was blown away by the extent of their collections, you could get lost in there quite easily! I particularly loved seeing the narwhal, tapir and sloth, all my favourites under one roof! Sometimes being surrounded by so much taxidermy can be oppressing, but because the building is so impressive, it carries it well! Plus, the animals are well looked after, not too old and shabby looking!

I was blown away by these stunning dioramas by Gustaf Werner, they lie behind a small pitch black room, so certainly take you by surprise when you peek through the glass! By far the most impressive i've seen to date - spot the moose!

If you find yourself in Gothenburg, you must pop in and say hello to the blue whale!

Thanks for reading!

Katie

For the last week I have been in Sweden with Bruce whilst he was setting up his solo show 'Cold Air Rising' at Box Gallery, Gothenburg. We were lucky enough to stay with our good friend Thom, who was a fantastic guide around the city (as well as a fantastic help with Bruces show!) and we had a really lovely Easter weekend! Momentously, it was my first ever plane journey - so needless to say I was a little nervous, but I did just fine, and I even flew home on my own, so it's another New Years Resolution crossed off the list!

Gothenburg is the second largest city in Sweden, but has a very relaxed and friendly feel, with lots of interesting streets to find coffee, secondhand goods and general nice things! (I blew the budget and came back with a very heavy suitcase!) One of the first landmarks to greet us after arriving was the famous Universeum Dinosaur, quite striking against the city skyline to say the least!

Easter was a great time to visit Sweden (even if it was a bit quiet for the first few days!) as they have some super traditions at this time of year which were lovely to see! These birch twigs decorated with feathers were all around town, in many windows and shops. This tradition dates back to the 19th century and is thought to encourage the arrival of spring as the twigs magically sprout their new colours!

There were plenty of gorgeous flowers around the city, I found it difficult not to return with a bunch of blooms everyday, there were so many lovely florists en-route. The Antique shops in Haga had some fantastic window displays of Easter themed items, I returned with lots of handmade items to bring out every year for Easter decorations, hooray!

There was more coffee and cinnamon baked goods on offer than I could have ever imagined, but I must admit I didn't take part in Fika every day, I can't take that amount of caffeine and sugar, my loss entirely! I did bring home a fantastic Nordic cookbook, I fully intend with cracking on with 'the classics', rye bread, beetroot salad and cinnamon buns ASAP!