With album sales in the double-digit millions and with over a million visits to the museum bearing their name, it’s safe to say you don’t have to be a diehard fan to feel ABBA magic all around stunning Stockholm. Spread across 14 unique islands, the city has provided an inspirational backdrop over the decades to many of their photoshoots and album covers.

Explore Djurgården

As evidenced by the autumnal photos taken for their Greatest Hits album, members of the group spent a lot of time around the island of Djurgården – the city’s greenest island – home to the ABBA museum. But Djurgården offers much more than album covers. Here you can also find some of Stockholm’s most impressive historical museums. Like Skansen, the oldest open-air museum in the world, and the Vasa museum, which is dedicated to a 17th century warship that capsized and sank in Stockholm’s harbour in 1628, and was salvaged almost in its entirety.
 

Sail the canals

If you’d rather not break a sweat, and prefer to glide instead of trot, the “ABBA The Museum” Boat Tour is a scenic summer sail around Stockholm’s canals and the island of Djurgården. You can listen to their rise-to-fame stories, and check out places where their movie was filmed, all the while singing to ABBA songs in the background. And guess where the tour ends? You got it… ABBA The Museum.

Be the fifth band member

The lights are dimmed as you nervously grab on to the microphone. You start to sway awkwardly as the music begins to play. Within seconds, Benny, Björn, Frida and Agnetha join you on stage, sporting their classic seventies bodysuits as other tourists watch you perform a virtual karaoke with their holograms. 

From ABBA paraphernalia and stage costumes, to wall upon wall of personal stories and recreated scenes from places where they wrote and recorded, these are just a few interactive experiences you’ll encounter as you wander around ABBA The Museum. There are a number of opportunities to “record” in a mock-up Polar Studio or to dance with a digital version of yourself in kitsch seventies outfits.

Create your own album cover

Many of the group’s album covers and famous photoshoots were created in Stockholm. And while you might go album-cover hunting yourself, why not create your own? Head over to the City Hall (Stadshuset) building located on the island of Kungsholmen and perfect your pose in front of one of Stockholm’s most beautiful buildings.

Take in dinner and a show at Mamma Mia, The Party!

If you’re beginning to tire of Swedish cuisine, consider combining a hearty Greek meal with an interactive show based on the smash-hit movie Mamma Mia! In a plant-lined Greek taverna at Tyrol on the island of Djurgården, dig into tzatziki, fried octopus, and veal patties, while actors perform and belt out ABBA classics within the self-enclosed ABBA portal that is Mamma Mia! The Party.

Enjoy a night out at Rival
For a bit of Swedish celeb-spotting, spend an evening at the boutique hotel Rival which is co-owned by former ABBA member Benny Andersson. A former theater, Rival in Mariatorget is quite the Technicolor burst with three cocktail bars, and an avant-garde restaurant decked out in crimson, mahogany and more than 900 card-sized images of movie stars. Try one of their signature cocktails – like the gin-lychee-Schweppes laced Made @ Rival. Perfect for finishing off the night in true superstar-stalker fashion.