The most beautiful places in Sweden

Sweden is a country of rare beauty, even amid its starkest northern landscapes. Its cities and towns testify to 1000 years of urban life, but there are precious places offering glimpses into even older traditions of human settlement.

Falun

For centuries Falun was the source of Sweden’s wealth in copper and was the biggest source of the metal in Europe. The town’s giant pit is now UNESCO world heritage-listed and a museum tells the story of a millennium of prosperity and technological development.

Around the mine are the buildings used by the miners and many of their wooden cottages, painted in the reddish-brown iron oxide coating that also came from the mine and was given the town’s name – faluröd.