Sergels torg, the square of triangles

The scenery changes. You are at Sergels torg, the most modern, noisy and debated square in Stockholm. Locals simply call it Plattan, 'the slab', after the large sunken plaza some ten metres below the old streets.

1A neighbourhood that vanished

This was Klara, a district of 18th- and 19th-century houses. From the 1950s the city demolished almost all of it to build a modern centre with a metro, offices, department stores and a row of five tower blocks, the Hötorget buildings. It was the great urban project of Sweden's welfare state, and also one of its most criticised decisions. The square took decades to plan and seven years to build.

2Named after a sculptor

During planning it was called Sveaplatsen. In the end, at the suggestion of the singer-songwriter Evert Taube, the city named it after Johan Tobias Sergel, Sweden's great 18th-century neoclassical sculptor. The triangle pattern on the ground, designed by the architect Jörgen Kjærgaard, became so famous that it ended up printed on ties and trays.

3The glass obelisk

In the roundabout fountain stands Kristallvertikalaccent, a 37-metre column of glass prisms by the sculptor Edvin Öhrström, unveiled in 1974. Water was meant to run down its edges, but that never worked. Since 2017 it has been lit at night with coloured LEDs.

Between 1971 and 1983 the Swedish Parliament met temporarily in the Kulturhuset building, on the other side of the square.

4What to look for

• The black and white triangles on the ground.
• The glass column in the fountain.
• Kulturhuset, the cultural centre with the glass front.