Fittja gård

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Fittja gård is a historic estate in Fittja, Botkyrka Municipality, near Stockholm. It started as a manor and grew into a large coaching inn and a station for post riders. The nearby Fittja Värdshus was one of Sweden’s biggest travellers’ inns in the 1600s and 1700s. The estate also housed the Svartlösa Hundred district court for a long time, from 1660 to 1916. The current main buildings were built in 1812. Today the site is well preserved as a cultural heritage place and hosts a multicultural centre founded in 1987. It also functions as a centre for migration studies with a large library, and UNESCO named it a Local Centre for Collaboration in 2014.

Key points in history:
- Fittja gård is first mentioned in 1299 and the village of Fittja grew up in the Middle Ages.
- During the Reformation the estate was confiscated, then bought by Erik van der Linde in 1631. A major road—Södertäljevägen (later Riksväg 1)—was completed nearby in 1669, making Fittja a main stop on the way south from Stockholm.
- The inn opened in the 1660s. In 1667 it became a post-rider station with its own stables. The estate also included a farm, a distillery and a brickworks.
- The Svartlösa Hundred court sat at Fittja gård for over 250 years. The main house was rebuilt in the mid-1700s.
- Notable visitors included kings Charles XII and Oscar I, scientist Carl Linnaeus, and poet Carl Michael Bellman.
- In 1809 Jacob Schmidt bought the estate, expanded and rebuilt the buildings, and created a large barn. The main house was moved a short distance in the early 1800s and a new Empire-style house was built in 1812.
- Schmidt’s money ran out in 1815, and the estate changed owners several times. In 1859 Lars Magnus Carlsson bought it; the inn’s liquor licence was revoked in 1873, but it kept operating until 1972.
- A brickworks opened in the 1860s and ran until 1964. Agriculture and brickmaking were the main incomes for many years.
- In the early 20th century the estate became a day-trip destination. The inn and farm activities declined, and the land around Fittjagård was gradually developed.
- In 1955 Ragnar Sellberg bought the estate and tried to create a garden city, but the plan failed. In 1967 the main buildings were sold to Stockholm Municipality and the outer land to a developer. After 1983 the buildings were renovated: the side buildings became a daycare, and the main house became a community house.
- Since 1987 the area has housed a multicultural centre and a migration-research museum with a large library. In 2014 UNESCO established a Local Centre for Collaboration in the main building. A pedestrian and bicycle path now runs where Värdshusvägen once did.