Top tips: Sweden's three biggest cities host free culture festivals
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Malmö
Malmöfestivalen celebrates its 40th anniversary this year as the city boasts more than 1,000 free activities running over eight days from August 8th to 15th.
Check out the festival website here to browse through the programme, locate all the venues and find the best places to eat.
Here are a few of the events that jumped out at us when looking through the schedule.
Event: Crayfish party
Date: August 8th, 18:05-19:30
Location: Main stage, Stortorget 1
Info: Singer Miriam Aïda gets the festival off to a flying start as she hosts a crayfish party set against a backdrop of Caribbean sounds and Swedish drinking songs.
Event: Bob Hund, Timbuktu
Date: August 8th, 20:30-22:00, 23:00-00:30
Location: Main stage, Stortorget 1
Info: Two of Skåne's best-loved musical sons ensure an electric opening night. This is one of the last-ever chances to see Bob Hund's charismatic frontman Thomas Öberg in action – after more than 30 years in perpetual motion, the band play their final concert in Stockholm on August 30th. They'll also be at the Gothenburg culture festival on August 28th.
Twenty years on from his iconic album 'Alla vill till himmelen men ingen vill dö', Timbuktu breathes fresh life into classics of Swedish hip hop in collaboration with the Harlem-based Rakiem Walker Project.
Event: Nancy Ajram
Date: August 10th, 19:30-20:30
Location: Main stage, Stortorget 1
Info: One of the absolute superstars of Arabic pop, Lebanon's multiple award-winning Nancy Ajram is sure to draw a huge crowd to the main stage.
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Stockholm
Kulturfestivalen has become a real fixture in the capital's cultural calendar since its inauguration back in 2005. Like the equivalent events in Malmö and Gothenburg, the festival offers tons of fun activities for children and families as well as attracting a high caliber of artists and performers.
Here are just a few highlights:
Event: Silent disco
Date: August 13th-17th, 18:00-00:00
Location: Strömgatan
Info: If you've never experienced the weird wonder of a silent disco, now's your chance to grab a set of headphones and dance in the open air with strangers on the same wavelength.
Event: Open-air cinema
Date: August 13th, 16:00-19:30
Location: Sjöhistoriska museet (National Maritime Museum)
Info: Make your way to the lovely waterside surroundings of the National Maritime Museum for an afternoon and evening of cinema, concluding with 'Att angöra en brygga', a classic film from 1965 by legendary comedy duo Hasse Alfredson and Tage Danielsson.
Event: Dina Ögon
Date: August 13th, 22:30-00:00
Location: Gustav Adolfs torg
Info: The Stockholm-based Dina Ögon have fast become one of Sweden's most popular live acts, and for good reason! Their gigs sell out quickly so this is an excellent opportunity to catch a band who describe themselves as "a love child of Fleetwood Mac, Khruangbin and obscure Motown b-sides."
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Gothenburg
Gothenburg promises to be a hive of activity from August 28th to 30th with its focus on street food, music, and tons of family-friendly activities. Have a look through the programme to see what what most appeals to you. Here are a few suggestions.
Event: Silvana Imam
Date: August 30th, 21:45.22:45
Location: Kungstorget, main stage
Info: One of the biggest names in Swedish hip hop and an excellent live performer, Silvana Imam returned this year with a new album, 'Tro', after a six year hiatus.
Event: Street food festival
Date: August 28th-30th
Location: Multiple locations, see link above
Info: All over central Gothenburg you'll find food trucks featuring cuisine from all over the world, as well as bars selling local craft beers and other drinks. There's also a competitive edge as chefs vie for prizes in the national street food awards.
Event: Free entry to Sjöfartsmuseet Akvariet
Date: August 30th, 10:00-17:00
Location: Karl Johansgatan 1-3
Info: Gothenburg has a proud maritime history and the Maritime Museum and Aquarium is one of the city's best museums, with exhibitions that appeal to adults and children alike.
READ ALSO: What changes in Sweden in August 2025
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Local Sweden
4 days ago
- Local Sweden
Top tips: Sweden's three biggest cities host free culture festivals
Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö all have free culture festivals coming up in the next few weeks. Here we pick out a few of the highlights from this year's bulging schedules. Advertisement Malmö Malmöfestivalen celebrates its 40th anniversary this year as the city boasts more than 1,000 free activities running over eight days from August 8th to 15th. Check out the festival website here to browse through the programme, locate all the venues and find the best places to eat. Here are a few of the events that jumped out at us when looking through the schedule. Event: Crayfish party Date: August 8th, 18:05-19:30 Location: Main stage, Stortorget 1 Info: Singer Miriam Aïda gets the festival off to a flying start as she hosts a crayfish party set against a backdrop of Caribbean sounds and Swedish drinking songs. Event: Bob Hund, Timbuktu Date: August 8th, 20:30-22:00, 23:00-00:30 Location: Main stage, Stortorget 1 Info: Two of Skåne's best-loved musical sons ensure an electric opening night. This is one of the last-ever chances to see Bob Hund's charismatic frontman Thomas Öberg in action – after more than 30 years in perpetual motion, the band play their final concert in Stockholm on August 30th. They'll also be at the Gothenburg culture festival on August 28th. Twenty years on from his iconic album 'Alla vill till himmelen men ingen vill dö', Timbuktu breathes fresh life into classics of Swedish hip hop in collaboration with the Harlem-based Rakiem Walker Project. Event: Nancy Ajram Date: August 10th, 19:30-20:30 Location: Main stage, Stortorget 1 Info: One of the absolute superstars of Arabic pop, Lebanon's multiple award-winning Nancy Ajram is sure to draw a huge crowd to the main stage. Advertisement Stockholm Kulturfestivalen has become a real fixture in the capital's cultural calendar since its inauguration back in 2005. Like the equivalent events in Malmö and Gothenburg, the festival offers tons of fun activities for children and families as well as attracting a high caliber of artists and performers. Here are just a few highlights: Event: Silent disco Date: August 13th-17th, 18:00-00:00 Location: Strömgatan Info: If you've never experienced the weird wonder of a silent disco, now's your chance to grab a set of headphones and dance in the open air with strangers on the same wavelength. Event: Open-air cinema Date: August 13th, 16:00-19:30 Location: Sjöhistoriska museet (National Maritime Museum) Info: Make your way to the lovely waterside surroundings of the National Maritime Museum for an afternoon and evening of cinema, concluding with 'Att angöra en brygga', a classic film from 1965 by legendary comedy duo Hasse Alfredson and Tage Danielsson. Event: Dina Ögon Date: August 13th, 22:30-00:00 Location: Gustav Adolfs torg Info: The Stockholm-based Dina Ögon have fast become one of Sweden's most popular live acts, and for good reason! Their gigs sell out quickly so this is an excellent opportunity to catch a band who describe themselves as "a love child of Fleetwood Mac, Khruangbin and obscure Motown b-sides." Advertisement Gothenburg Gothenburg promises to be a hive of activity from August 28th to 30th with its focus on street food, music, and tons of family-friendly activities. Have a look through the programme to see what what most appeals to you. Here are a few suggestions. Event: Silvana Imam Date: August 30th, 21:45.22:45 Location: Kungstorget, main stage Info: One of the biggest names in Swedish hip hop and an excellent live performer, Silvana Imam returned this year with a new album, 'Tro', after a six year hiatus. Event: Street food festival Date: August 28th-30th Location: Multiple locations, see link above Info: All over central Gothenburg you'll find food trucks featuring cuisine from all over the world, as well as bars selling local craft beers and other drinks. There's also a competitive edge as chefs vie for prizes in the national street food awards. Event: Free entry to Sjöfartsmuseet Akvariet Date: August 30th, 10:00-17:00 Location: Karl Johansgatan 1-3 Info: Gothenburg has a proud maritime history and the Maritime Museum and Aquarium is one of the city's best museums, with exhibitions that appeal to adults and children alike. READ ALSO: What changes in Sweden in August 2025
Local Sweden
6 days ago
- Local Sweden
How joining a chess club deepened my roots in Sweden
Here at The Local we're always recommending that people join Swedish clubs as a way of becoming more integrated. Paul O'Mahony decided it was finally time to practise what he preached – and met some inspiring fellow chess-lovers along the way. Advertisement For the past year and a half or so I've been accompanying my children to training sessions at Kristallen, a Stockholm-based chess club. Sitting on the sidelines with other parents I found that my ears would prick up whenever their coach, Olov Hamilton, would talk through a master game on the big screen. I've always enjoyed playing chess but had never taken my interest beyond playing online or occasional over-the-board games with friends and family. But Olov's enthusiasm was infectious and I found I couldn't take my eyes off Bobby Fischer's devastating combination play, or a mating pattern delivered with delicious precision by the Hungarian grandmaster Judit Polgar. And sitting there, listening to the story of the three Polgar sisters and their meteoric rise, a frightening thought struck me: my children would quickly become stronger players than me. They would grow bored of playing against an old-timer drifting further and further below their level. So in April I signed the forms and paid the fees and suddenly a whole new world opened itself up to me. Advertisement Riding the Queen's Gambit chess boom Before joining the club it hadn't really clicked with me just how popular chess had become. It turns out that the Netflix series The Queen's Gambit had coincided with the start of the Covid pandemic. Millions of people with time on their hands quickly developed a voracious appetite for the game. A whole ecosystem now exists, made up of countless chess YouTube accounts, online learning tools, and podcasts. Sweden very much got swept up in this rising tide. When recently published statistics for every country in the world, Sweden came fourth in terms of per capita users, with an incredible 1.9 million accounts registered here. And while the boom is most evident online, over-the-board play is also on the rise. The Swedish Chess Federation hit an all-time high last year, with more than 45,000 members playing in the country's many chess clubs. Just this week the enduring chess icon Pia Cramling became the first ever Swede to be inducted into the Chess Hall of Fame. The Stockholm native was just the fifth ever woman to achieve the title of grandmaster and was at one point the highest ranked woman in the world. Funnily enough, a lot of people these days get to know Pia Cramling through her daughter Anna. A strong player in her own right, Anna Cramling's YouTube channel boasts more than 1.5 million followers as she attracts new players to the game with entertaining and instructive videos from the world of chess. Advertisement Checkmates: Getting to know new people through chess As we've written about previously on The Local, clubs – or föreningar – are Sweden's social lifeblood. Getting involved gives you fresh insights into the centrality of shared interests as a social lubricant. As a club member I was now eligible to play in tournaments and so in May I headed out to a competition in Tyresö just outside Stockholm. As I sat and played out a four-hour marathon game, I could see my 12-year-old son deep in thought at a nearby table as he faced off against an 87-year-old woman who was the tournament's oldest competitor. This meeting of minds across the generational divide is one of the most appealing things about chess. To my surprise I managed to win one of my first games and the rush of adrenaline that accompanied that first victory will live with me for a long time. The thrill of an online checkmate pales into insignificance compared to what now felt like the real deal. There were losses too of course but there's nothing like a shared interest to kickstart conversations, and in the few brief months since joining the club I've already met a host of interesting people. Advertisement These include Ahmad Sa'dah, a Jordanian coach and the chief organiser of the Jönköping Chess Festival. Ahmad and his team from the Jordanian Swedish Chess Academy managed to attract some of the best players in Sweden and beyond for a tournament that just celebrated its second anniversary. Last week my family and I spent our days on the beach at Lake Vättern and our evenings competing with players young and old from Sweden, Jordan, Nigeria, UAE and Iraq, to name just a few of the participating nationalities. A wonderful experience Another name that springs to mind is David Ajena, a local chess enthusiast who recently launched Stockholm Chess, a hugely welcoming weekly meetup for players of all levels that takes place at Kulturhuset in Stockholm every Sunday afternoon. Autumn holds the promise of many new encounters. As is often the case in Sweden, once you're in you're really in. And so, starting later this month I'll be standing side-by-side with Olov as an assistant coach, welcoming kids and their parents for the new term. After a quarter of a century in Sweden, the roots I've put down here just got deeper. And I couldn't be happier.
Local Sweden
17-07-2025
- Local Sweden
Swedish word of the day: slöjd
Today's word of the day is one you've probably heard if you have school-age kids in Sweden. Advertisement Slöjd is a bit of an umbrella term. It usually refers to some kind of creative or crafty activity including some degree of handiwork, for example träslöjd (woodwork), metallslöjd (metalwork) and textil- or syslöjd (textile crafts, like knitting, or sewing and embroidery). It's also a compulsory subject for Swedish schoolchildren. Prior to the 1960s, slöjd was split into manlig slöjd (male slöjd), which consisted of work with hard materials like wood and metal, and kvinnlig slöjd, (female slöjd), using textiles. Now, however, all children in Swedish schools try both types of slöjd, switching each semester. It also used to be a school subject taught in the US in the early 20th century, known as sloyd in English. Don't miss any of our Swedish words and expressions of the day by downloading The Local's app (available on Apple and Android) and then selecting the Swedish Word of the Day in your Notification options via the User button Slöjd differs from pyssel in that it is more advanced and usually requires some sort of skill, and often cannot be completed in one sitting. Pyssel, on the other hand, is a simpler kind of craft that is simple enough for even a small child to carry out, and usually can be finished in an hour or so without any kind of special tools. The word slöjd originally comes from an Old Norse word meaning skilled or crafty, and has the same root as sleight in the English phrase sleight of hand. Slöjd is still an important part of Swedish culture, and you can often find shops in major cities selling either the materials needed for slöjd or traditional Swedish handicrafts like Dala horses, handwoven textiles or small wooden figurines carved with a knife. Advertisement Example sentences: Jag jobbar som slöjdlärare i en grundskola. I work as a crafts teacher in a primary school. Jag gillar träslöjd men det kräver mycket plats och dyra verktyg. I like woodwork but you need a lot of space and expensive tools. Villa, Volvo, Vovve: The Local's Word Guide to Swedish Life, written by The Local's journalists, is available to order. Head to to read more about it. It is also possible to buy your copy from Amazon US, Amazon UK, Bokus or Adlibris.
