Stora Hammars kyrka

The church was built to replace the too-small 12th-century Stora Hammars gamla kyrka and was consecrated on 30 November 1902. It was designed by the architect Magnus Steendorff, whose plans drew on the Danish-Dutch Renaissance style associated with Christian IV, with echoes of Rosenborg Castle in Copenhagen and Trefaldighetskyrkan in Kristianstad. Although the old church was originally intended to be demolished once its replacement was ready, the demolition never went ahead; the older building was instead restored, so the parish today has two churches bearing the Stora Hammar name.

The two bells in the tower were carried over from the old church rather than newly cast: the larger dates from 1844 and was cast by Speip & Liljendahl in Stockholm, while the smaller was cast in Kristianstad in 1851 by G O Fredriksson.

The altarpiece, painted in 1901 by Julius Kronberg, depicts the mourning of the dead Christ by Mary, Joseph of Arimathea and Mary Magdalene. Among the furnishings are brass candlesticks and chandeliers given by parishioners around the time of the 1902 consecration, a 1995 woven altar carpet by Anna-Lisa Menander inspired by the sea around the Falsterbo peninsula, and a textile hanging by Birgitta Ljungberg (1991) near the font. A recessed, glass-fronted cabinet in the chancel displays the church's communion silver, including a 17th-century chalice remodelled in 1749 and a paten of the same date.

One of the more unusual items is a large Bible kept in a glass case: reportedly a copy of the Danish king Frederick II's 1589 folio Bible, a fine example of early printing. According to the sources, Danish Bibles in Skåne were confiscated in the 1690s after the region became Swedish, since services were required to be held in Swedish and from Swedish Bibles, and some Danish copies were hidden or sold back to Denmark rather than destroyed.

The organ has an involved history. The original 1902 instrument by Thorsell & Erikson of Gothenburg left behind an ornamental silent façade and swallow's-nest gallery that still frame the current organ. Sources disagree on what followed: one account describes a mechanical organ built in 1968 by Troels Krohn of Frederiksborg Orgelbyggeri in Denmark, later enlarged; another describes a substantial rebuild completed in 2018 incorporating pipework from an 1897 American organ built by Charles S. Haskell for a church in Philadelphia, acquired and reworked with a 31-stop specification by organ builder Tomaz Mocnik. Visitors interested in organs may find this an especially interesting instrument to ask about locally.

The churchyard includes a memorial grove and a notable copper beech, along with a Biblical garden on the east side planted with species named in the Bible.