Modern Stockholm: Living with Style, Innovation and Coffee

Mon, 10 Feb 2014 13:57:38 -0500

After learning about Sweden’s medieval and pre-industrialization history, I wanted to feel the pulse of contemporary Sweden. The trendier parts of Stockholm (I stayed in the Sofo neighborhood, a play on NYC’s Soho) are chic and streamlined, like walking around a giant IKEA store, or hipper-than-thou neighborhoods in Brooklyn (cough, Williamsburg). You can get a good read on the city by simply hopping between cafes, which are present in abundance at a density that rivals Italian cities. These cafes often serve espresso and cinnamon rolls, and you can also find hybrids like cafe-thrift stores, cafe-record stores, cafe-office, cafe-hair salon, etc. Swedes take their coffee very seriously it seems, perhaps as a substitute for alcohol. This is, of course, by design, since Sweden has a state-run monopoly on alcohol sales and the prices are inflated to discourage drinking in prodigious quantities. All this means that Swedes go to Denmark or Germany to bring back cheaper booze.

Coffee on adventures of an omnomnomnivore in NYC

Modern Stockholm: Living with Style, Innovation and Coffee