Birger Jarlsgatan strikes north from Nybroplan, now a major shopping street but until 1855 the site of two pillories and largely rural. Segels Torg to Hotorget KungstradgSrden reaches from the water northwards as far as Hamngatan, at the western end of which, past the enormous NK department store, lies Sergels Torg, modern Stockholm at its most blatant. It's an unending free show centred around the five seething floors of the Kulturhuset (Mon ground floor only 10am8pm; otherwise Tues llam7pm, WedFri llam6pm. Sat & Sun 11am Spm; reading room MonFri from 9am, Sat & Sun from noon), whose windows look down upon the milling square. Inside this building, devoted to contemporary Swedish culture, are temporary art and craft exhibitions together with workshops open to anyone willing to get their hands dirty. The reading room (Ldsesalongen) on the ground level is stuffed with foreign newspapers, books, records and magazines and people when it's wet. Check the information desk on the ground floor for details of poetry readings, concerts and theatre performances these and everything else, including admission, are free. There's also a cafe on the top floor. A spewing fountain, around a tall, wirelike column, dominates the massive space outside, while one level down in Sergels Arkaden buskers, brass bands and the odd demonstration interfere with shoppers and browsers. There's also an entrance into TCentralen, the central Tbana station, on this level. With money to spend, the shopping area around Sergels Torg is where consumption in Stockholm becomes most conspicuous, but even if you head north, it's difficult to get excited by the city's grid of pedestrianised shopping streets. In summer, the odd jewellery stall and busker add a bit of variety but basically it's a glut of Nordic consumerism expensive clothes for expansive wallets as far as Hotorget that IS. In this square you'll find an openair fiuit and veg market and, below, the wonderful indoor Hotorgshallen rambling, gluttonous food halls with ethnic acks. Pick up a falafel and some finit and munch on the crowded steps of the •tonserthuset one of the venues for the presentation of the Nobel Prizes. North to Adolf Fredrikskyrka parallel streets run uphill and north as far as Odengatan and the of " Continuing on foot gives you glances of the odd bit апТ' ay here and there, and, along the way, diversions include notable church. The Strindbergsmuseet (TuesFri Ацеис;.: noon4pm; 20kr) is housed in the last building in which btnndberg lived in Stockholm, the socalled "Blue Tower" at Drottninggatan 85. ТЪе house, which was the writer's home between 1908 and 1912, has been preserved to the extent that you must put plastic bags on your feet to protect the floors and furnishings. The study is as he left it on his death, a dark and gloomy place he wrote with Venetian blinds and heavy curtains closed against the sunlight.