What next?

Well, it’s hard to walk right past an Oleana shop without stopping by.

And there might just have been another womenswear store opposite where I was persuaded to make a purchase, too.  That one was interesting for being the first cash-free store I’ve come across.  Sweden is becoming a cash-free society.

I wanted to take a look in Gudrun Sjoden whilst I was here, too.  Nothing here for me today, though.

So we returned to the last part of the Palace, past this “laundry and tailoring” shop.  For once, I could not even begin to guess “Tvatt & Skadderi” and had to google it!

Into the Armoury Museum then – and a most surprising flavour of the contents in the ticket office, don’t you think?  Well, it could partly be explained by the description offered on the website:

“It was in this royal armoury that Gustavus Adolphus in the 1620s wanted his blood-spattered clothes to be saved "as a perpetual memorial". This became the Royal Armoury's hallmark: blood-marked costumes preserved to bear witness to royal valour.”

And there’s me, thinking the armoury would be full of, well, arms.

OK.  Let’s go!

First, a neat bit of graffiti on the wall.  Now, there is a lot of graffiti here and most of it isn’t so decorative or carefully executed.  I doubt that most of that will still be there in almost two hundred years.  Or?

The opening image is of this huge coat of arms, in soft faded colours.  It was so beautifully lit, too.

This was a modern museum housed in the old stable block of the castle and it was extraordinarily well designed.  Each item was labelled, but the whole collection was attractively arranged behind glass walls and carefully lit to highlight the features.  The rooms themselves were rather dark and it took a while for our eyes to become accustomed to the light levels.

There were several of these elaborate saddle arrangements, some incorporating armour but all highly decorative.

But as usual, there was one item which stood out for me.  I stood for a while looking at this cloak and reading the caption beneath it.  It seemed as though it had been worn in a battle in 1718 and as I looked more closely, I began to think about that mud.  Was that 18th century mud then? It would have to be, wouldn’t it?  I mean, no museum would take an 18th century costume and put mud on it subsequently…

Then I looked more closely at a slightly different caption nearby.  It seemed as though Karl XII had been wearing this uniform in a battle in 1718 when he was killed.

Oh.

I noticed the word blodfläckar on the label and nudged my Hero who questioned my logic.  Did it actually say “this was the uniform he was wearing when he was killed”?

Errm.  No, maybe it didn’t.  But I felt confident that I’d drawn the correct conclusion, even though I don’t speak any Swedish and didn’t really understand every word of the label.  thankfully, google is a wonderful thing and not only did I find a whole lot more about Karl XII I think I found enough to convince even my Hero that my assumption had been right.

It was a fine example of the “blood-marked costumes preserved to bear witness to royal valour” wasn’t it?

There were a few examples of “real” armour there, too.

and a cute section on Royal childrenswear, too.  But when we reached the play section and dressing up box, we knew we’d reached the end.

Of this floor.

Because downstairs, there was more.

With creaking knees and aching feet, I braved the staircase (!) and as soon as I saw the first exhibit forgot all about how tired I felt!

Once again, the displays were beautifully arranged and really well lit.

Even though I’m not really interested in such things, it was hard not to be captivated.

What a great museum!

Having taken all the photos, ooohed and aaahed over those great horses (were they flock-covered or what?  we couldn’t tell but looked as closely as we dared!) it was time to go.  We wearily climbed the stairs and exited through the gift shop.

We caught up with one another in the lobby, where a couple of benches were too good to pass by without trying   As we did, we took more notice of the display there.  What was it all about?  Was there another exhibit in here?  Upstairs maybe?

As I read more, I knew that, however tired I felt, however heavy my feet were, I simply had to go and have a look at it.

I’ll tell you all about it in the next post!