Lillienhoff Palace

The Lillienhoff Palace (Swedish Lillienhoffska palatset) is a building located on a corner of the large square Medborgarplatsen in southcentral Stockholm.

Lillienhoff Palace facing east

It was built in 1668–1670 by merchant Joachim Pötter who was ennobled under the name of Lillienhoff. Blueprints were by Johan Tobias Albinus. The facades are decorated with motifs from Dutch baroque, as was common in Stockholm's palace architecture in the middle of the 17th century. The palace originally had a garden to the west toward a lake that was there then called Fatburen. The current roof design is from 1786. Some interiors have been maintained intact.

The palace was purchased by Great Britain in 1723 to serve as its embassy in Sweden and has thus also been called the English Building. After that usage, it served as the poor house for Catherine's Parish until 1888, and was bought by the City of Stockholm in 1900. In the 1950s-1960s the Druvan (Grape) restaurant at the palace was popular, and since 1993 a large restaurant called Snaps[1][2] takes up the ground floor, an enclosed subterranean courtyard to the west and (summers) also a sizable patio on the square. There are offices and residential apartments in the rest of the building. Starting in the early 1970s, there have also been popular discothèques in an underground lounge.

Literature

• Stormaktstidens privatpalats i Stockholm 1951

See also

• Architecture of Stockholm

References

1. History on restaurant's website
2. Article by Peter Carlberg in Svenska Dagbladet 2005-04-06

• Information plate attached to an outer wall by Samfundet S:t Erik
• Book by Fredric Bedoire 1977
• Book by Olof Hultin 2002

External links