A terracotta-pink manor house deep in Sweden's snowy south has quietly become one writer's annual Christmas ritual — and it's easy to see why. Hoby Kulle Herrgård, a restored 1840s estate in the rural far south of Skåne, opens its doors each December for a festive season of julbord feasts, candlelit corridors and four-poster beds, and guests keep coming back.
The story starts with owners Tove and Benjamin, a Stockholm-born couple who met at a party in 2018 and, within a year, did what friends called crazy: bought an abandoned country manor with plans to renovate it themselves. Benjamin was a chef, Tove an events coordinator in Barcelona. They restored the original features, hung antiques from Swedish auction houses, and had traditional floral motifs hand-painted across the walls — Tove painted one guest room's limewash blue walls herself at eight months pregnant. The house even comes with a gothic backstory: it was built for newlyweds Isaac Otto Ruben and Carolina von Rosen, who ignored warnings about a Viking burial ground on the land and both died mysteriously, reportedly poisoned after a ball.
Today it operates less like a hotel and more like staying with friends. There's no reception, no porter — you let yourself in and someone finds you. Ten double rooms, some with shared bathrooms rather than private ones (book a master suite early if that bothers you), are dressed with fabrics from Gotain, lighting by Creme Atelier and artist Sofia Lind's work. Seasonal openings are limited: summer goes largely to weddings, spring brings bed-and-breakfast stays timed to lambs and hatching chicks, and Midsommar brings greenhouse dinners, local musicians and white ponies on the lawn.
But December is the headline act. The house fills with wreaths, bows, studded clementines and a proper julbord — the Swedish festive buffet of ham, smoked salmon, meatballs and cheeses. On the writer's first visit, she and her boyfriend arrived on opening weekend as the only non-Swedes in the room, were handed glasses of wine and folded straight into dinner with the local townsfolk. Mornings mean trays of Swedish breakfast outside your door: lingonberry juice, boiled eggs, breads, coffee, with frost on the windowpanes.
Getting there is part of the appeal — fly to Copenhagen, train across the Øresund bridge to Malmö, then roughly three hours driving north through tree-lined, snow-covered lanes. Deer crossings are apparently part of the experience.
Why it matters: if you're craving an unplugged, small-scale festive trip, this is the counterpoint to a resort Christmas. It's family-run, deeply local, and the kind of place where the owners' kids send returning guests handmade cards. Repeat visits are common — the writer has been back every November for three years — and rooms are few, so book well ahead for the December openings.
