Fiskebäcks kapell stands beside a lakeside settlement on the south-western shore of Lake Vättern, in an area that has had a church since medieval times. The present timber chapel, built in 1939, replaced a long-vanished parish church and now serves Habo parish.
A church is believed to have stood on this site since the Middle Ages, possibly built around the same time as Habo church. Fiskebäck was then its own parish, complete with a rectory and churchyard. According to local tradition, the earliest wooden church was founded by a noblewoman rescued from distress at sea, though this should be treated as legend rather than established fact.
That medieval church burned down around 1623, and a timber cruciform church was raised in its place. Growing dissatisfaction among parishioners living to the north eventually led to the church being dismantled and moved some 15 kilometres away to the newly formed parish of Gustav Adolf in 1780, when Fiskebäck's own parish was absorbed into Habo. For more than a century afterwards, only the churchyard and a bell tower remained on the site.
The bell tower standing west of the chapel is thought to date from the 1600s, making it older than the chapel itself; it was repaired in 1931 under architect Göran Pauli, with new panelling and replacement of rot-damaged timber.
The present chapel was designed by architect Martin Westerberg and consecrated in December 1939, originally intended as a funerary chapel. It is a modest wooden building on a black-painted concrete plinth, with a nave and narrower chancel to the north, red-painted vertical timber panelling, and a distinctive tall, narrow four-sided ridge turret with a pointed spire. Sources differ slightly on its original colour, suggesting it may first have been painted white or green rather than red; it is unclear when the red paint scheme now seen was first applied.
Few historic furnishings remain in the chapel itself. A font thought to date from the 1100s and a German altar cabinet from the 1400s, both once used in the earlier Fiskebäck church, have since been removed to museum collections in Skara and Stockholm respectively. A carved memorial stone to a seventeenth-century steward of the Brahe family at Visingsborg is set into the chancel gable wall. The chapel also houses a small mechanical organ, moved here in 2007 from another Habo church.
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Habo pastorat
Habo pastorat
Fiskebäcks kapell stands beside a lakeside settlement on the south-western shore of Lake Vättern, in an area that has had a church since medieval times. The present timber chapel, built in 1939, replaced a long-vanished parish church and now serves Habo parish.
Fiskebäckstomt 1, 566 91, HABO
Explore this church: Fiskebäcks kapellChurch information: Svenska kyrkan, Platser · CC BY 4.0. Each church page includes its credits and visiting notes.
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View church details: Molla kyrkaSources, credits and English adaptations are identified on each church page. Provider data: Svenska kyrkan, Platser · CC BY 4.0.
Provider catalogue data: Svenska kyrkan, Platser, CC BY 4.0. Separately credited descriptions retain their stated source and licence terms. Catalogue and visiting data reformatted from the provider. The English guide combines and abridges separately credited sources below.
Provider record updated: 3 Apr 2025. This is not an independent verification date.
Source record: e18b3144-4685-4fdb-8261-5065778a13ce
This English guide combines, abridges and translates the sources below with AI assistance, with editorial contributions by Churches in Sweden. It has not been independently verified. The adapted guide text is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Photographs and map data have their own terms.