The eccentric one

The Rival
It has a bed in the lobby, John Lee Hooker drifting through the sound system, an art-deco cinema and an original 1940s cocktail bar with a dancefloor and DJs at weekends. There is even an in-house bakery. The multifunctional Rival is owned by Abba’s Benny Andersson, and it couldn’t be more eccentric.

The hotel overlooks a pretty, peaceful square in the once working-class, now arty Sodermalm neighbourhood, Stockholm’s Notting Hill. Its 99 rooms are a mix of woods and whites, each with a giant Swedish movie still above the bed — mainly Bergman and Garbo, but, if you’re unlucky, Benny himself in Abba the Movie — and a glass wall separating bathroom and boudoir. As well as a 32in plasma television and CD and DVD players, you get a teddy bear from Debenhams.

Doubles £96-£299, B&B; 00 46 8 5457 8900, www.rival.se

The plush one

The Grand
This pink and palatial beaux-arts hotel doesn’t just sit on the waterfront, it presides over it. Stockholm’s other des res, the Royal Palace, is right across the water, so draw your curtains, otherwise you might surprise the king.

Opened in 1874, the Grand has a gold-leafed guestbook full of the great and the good, including Nobel-prize laureates who put up here prior to collecting their gongs. Indeed, the hotel used to host the ceremony in its Hall of Mirrors, a replica of the original in Versailles — be sure to take a peek.

The entire place is posh-plush, with gilt, stucco and marble. From almost a third of the 300 bedrooms, you can watch the toing and froing of boats in the harbour.

Doubles from £260, B&B, rising to £1,000 for the rooftop Flag Suite, with its own glass tower; 00 46 8 679 3500, www.grandhotel.se

The romantic one

Hotel J
This boaty place, slap beside the water and named after the J-class yachts used in the America’s Cup, is more seaside than city, yet only a 15-minute taxi ride from downtown. The best way to arrive, though, is by boat — shuttle services from the Nybroviken quayside run frequently in summer, occasionally in winter.

The feel is utterly Swedish — cool yet cosy, with pure-white decor, blue- and white-striped fabrics and pale oak furniture. Rooms have a real fire in the living-room hearth, lots of candles and blanket wraps to take the chill off out on the sunset-facing terrace. Very romantic. Half of J’s 45 rooms have sea views, some have balconies, and one — number 216 — has a private roof terrace.

Doubles from £100, B&B (sea-view rooms from £140, room 216 from £210); 00 46 8 601 3000, www.hotelj.com

The designer one

Lydmar
This is more club than hotel, fronted by a lobby lounge where DJs and live bands perform three or four nights a week. Even the lift offers a choice of 10 push-button sounds (reggae on the way up, perhaps, and blues for going down).

Don’t worry about sleepless nights, though. The 62 designer rooms don’t start until the fourth floor. Each has a plasma screen on which you can watch movies from the library, choose from 30,000 music tracks, scan your sightseeing photos and send e-mails to show off to your friends about it — all for free. Rooms are graded like T-shirts — XS to XXL — and 14 of them have doors leading onto a wraparound balcony.

As a guest at Lydmar you get to dodge the doormen at hot spots such as Kharma, Spy Bar, Sturecompagniet and East.

Doubles £100-£576, B&B; 00 46 8 5661 1300, www.lydmar.se

The budget one

Lamgholmen
For more than two centuries, this was Sweden’s main maximum-security nick, built on its own wooded island, but still in Stockholm central. Last used for involuntary guests in 1975, its cells have been recycled into hotel rooms — although the bars at the windows and the Porridge-style central atrium mean there’s no mistaking its heritage.

Today, Langholmen is part youth hostel (twin bunks, no linen), part hotel (larger doubles with linen) and part museum — cell 4 has been preserved to show the way things were — with freshwater swimming in Lake Malaren, lots of doorstep greenery and a shop selling stripy T-shirts and ball-and-chains.

A hostel cell, with shared facilities including a kitchen and a laundry, starts at £15pp. Linen can be hired. Only 13 rooms have double beds: from £90, B&B; 00 46 8 720 8500, www.langholmen.com

Travel brief

Getting there: you can fly to Stockholm from eight UK airports, as well as Dublin and Shannon. Arlanda airport is 25 miles from the city and is linked by frequent trains (journey time 20 minutes). It is served by British Airways (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com), SAS (0870 607 2772, www.flysas.com) and Finnair (0870 241 4411, www.finnair.com). Alternatively, the airports at Skavsta (55 miles away) and Vasteras (65 miles away) are served by Ryanair (www.ryanair.com).

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