Gustaf Adolfskyrkan

The church was designed by architect Carl Möller and built between 1890 and 1892 as a garrison church for the Svea Life Guards, whose own soldiers reportedly carried out much of the masonry and woodwork. It was named after King Gustav II Adolf and consecrated in November 1892, according to Wikipedia in the presence of King Oscar II and other members of the royal family, though the parish's own account gives the consecrating bishop as Gottfrid Billing without mentioning royal attendance.

The building is a smaller-scale, asymmetrical variation on the brick Neo-Gothic style Möller had already used at Sankt Johannes kyrka, with English-influenced planning: a lower north aisle, a square north-west tower housing the main entrance, a sacristy to the north-west and a porch projecting to the south-west. The west portal, carved in limestone, depicts Saint George and the dragon, alongside a relief of Gustav II Adolf, and large rose windows with heavy stone tracery light the east and west gables.

Inside, the walls and ceiling were originally painted by Agi Lindegren, though little of this decoration survives beneath the present whitewash. The pointed windows to north and south, depicting Swedish kings, battles and regimental emblems, were made by the artist Cecilia Bachér after Möller's sketches. Much of the woodwork — pews, pulpit and altarpiece — was produced by army recruits at the regiment's own craft school, under the guidance of the woodcarver Lieutenant John Klingspor. The altarpiece painting, The Good Shepherd, is on loan from the Waldemarsudde collection and is attributed to the Danish artist Joakim Skovgaard.

The congregation's role in the church changed considerably over the twentieth century. Following a 1925 parliamentary decision, military chaplaincy at the garrison largely ceased by 1928, leaving the church's future uncertain; demolition or conversion to other uses, including a cinema, was reportedly considered during the 1920s, and for a time it was let to an Episcopalian congregation. It found new purpose after the development of housing at Gärdet in the 1930s, becoming one of Oscars parish's churches from 1938. Sources differ slightly on the purchase date, with the parish record citing the 1960s and Wikipedia specifying 1964, after which the interior was restored under architect Björn Linn (the parish text also names Erik Helenius as a co-director of a 1967-68 restoration).

The church's mechanical organ dates from 1969, built by Åkerman & Lund of Knivsta, replacing an earlier 1944 instrument by the same firm and, before that, an electric organ and a harmonium.