Midsommarstockholm

It can be a spooky feeling arriving to Stockholm during the Midsummer weekend. Most locals leave the city Thursday afternoon to celebrate Midsummer in the archipelago or wherever their summer house is located. I kinda like cycling and walking around Stockholm during that period, and here are a few snaps from last Saturday. The first photo shows the underside of a passage connecting two buildings at Klara Norra Kyrkogata at Norrmalm. Designed by Erik Lallerstedt back in the 1930s. Normally heavy traffic here, but not on this day, so I could stand in the middle of the street photographing. Butterick's change their display window quite often. This is their Summer window, and if you look more closely at it to the left... Eastern European man playing the accordion outside Buttericks in the third photo. He played a very modern pop tune. Two seconds after I snapped my photo, a guy walked up with a few bills. Next, what I was actually looking for. Empty seats! A café at the very trendy Gamla Brogatan, but closed for Midsummer. Sko Uno opened for business when I was a teenager. Hip then, hip now. They sell shoes. But also jeans at another store, and the bird in the fifth photo is their jeans' logo. I tried photographing the Blue Fox store window earlier in the week, but it was too many people walking by. Easier now. Next, a look at the pedestrian street itself. Normally packed with people, but now it was just people at the one open restaurant, a few wandering tourists, and me. The Swans have been there for a few years. Around the corner back on Klara Norra Kyrkogata I stopped for a few overhead photos of the ironworks at this door. Next, a clock that is one of a pair, also designed by Erik Lallerstedt 90 years ago. We finish where we started. I parked my bike here and, looking past the old post building, we can see the church tower at Klara, that one is three photos stitched together.