Despite a reign that oversaw runaway expenses, a consolidation of royal power and an unsuccessful military attack on Russia, Gustav III somehow remains one of Sweden’s most beloved kings, perhaps because he managed to put the country on an

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Despite a reign that oversaw runaway expenses, a consolidation of royal power and an unsuccessful military attack on Russia, Gustav III somehow remains one of Sweden’s most beloved kings, perhaps because he managed to put the country on an international map then dominated by the much more populous likes of France, Austria and Prussia. An avid “arts patron” (wink, wink) and “world traveler” (nudge, nudge), Gustav was almost certainly a homosexual; though he married, he had little to do with his wife, and preferred to spend as much time as possible apart from her here at his pavilion, construction of which began in 1787 and was still underway on the fateful March night in 1792 when Gustav left from here for the theater, only to be assassinated. Today the Pavilion is lovingly preserved and open to the public from June to August.

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