Secret Rooms - The Old Central Post Office Building

Way overdue, here is the third/fourth place in the Secret Rooms-series - the two/three previous ones can be found here and here - the Old Central Post Office.

A grand Art Noveau building situated in the city centre quite close to the Central Station. Built at the turn of the 19-20th century, designed by the architect Ferdinand Boberg - who also designed amongst other places Waldemarsudde, Rosenbad, department store NK and one of my favourite buildings in Stockholm, the Thielska Gallery.

It's indeed a beautiful building, very rich in ornamentation, outside as well as inside, gorgeous paintings, nature's materials and inventive, quirky details. The place was inaugurated October 27 1903, hence celebrating its 105 year's birthday in about a week. It has been rebuilt, enlarged and renovated several times during the years, and many of the interior parts are surprisingly (and boringly) modern.

In 2004 the Post Office headquarters moved to new premises and the Old Post Office building was taken over by the Swedish National Property Board (Statens Fastighetsverk, the public authority hosting that memorable event of Secret Rooms). It has since undergone extensive renovations in order to accomodate the new tentant from April 2008, the Government Offices in parts.

My favourite part of the building, apart from its pretty facade, and the stroll was without a doubt the smallish tower room, very Harry Potterish in style and ambiance somehow - I hope the new tenant makes good brainstorming room use of it...

The leather chairs in the assembly room just below this tower room was absolutely beautiful too - I hope the cows whose leather have been used in making such fine pieces are given due gratitude whenever used...

This was the last Secret Room we had the time and pleasure of visiting that day in May. I hope there will be more events like this, it was quite a lovely idea indeed, I would have liked to be able to visit some of the castles open that day in the outskirts of Stockholm suburbs.

One anno dazumal postal employee working the balloons

The pink floor, so you won't get lost at work

Lovely carpet for the new tenant

One of the ground floor assembly areas

Pretty lampshade, Harry Potterish tower room and a lamp like this, bet brilliant ideas will be had by new tenants...

Snazzy new kitchen with lovely pink tiles

Beautiful staircase

Carrier pigeons detail at the facade

If you want to read more about the Old Central Post Office in Swedish, there's a nice article at the National Property Board's website.