VASA MUSEUM

Description

Essentials about the Vasa Museum in brief

The Vasa Museum is probably the most unique museum in Stockholm. It houses the warship Vasa, which lay at the bottom of the sea in Stockholm harbor for 333 years after sinking on its maiden voyage in 1628. Today, the Vasa is the best-preserved ship of the 17th century. The unique cultural treasure comprises 98 percent of the original parts, including hundreds of artistically carved wooden sculptures. This museum is not only worth a visit for amateur captains.

The ship “Vasa”

In 1625, King Gustav II Adolf commissioned the construction of a new warship that was to become the pride of the Swedish fleet. With a length of almost 70 meters, masts over 50 meters high, 64 heavy cannons and decorations made of gilded and painted wooden figures, the Vasa more than lived up to this claim. More than 1,000 oak trees were used to build the ship.

The sinking

At five o’clock in the afternoon on August 10, 1628, thousands of onlookers line the Stockholm waterfront. They all want to witness the magnificent warship setting sail on its first voyage. But instead they witness a catastrophe. After barely a nautical mile, the Vasa sinks in Stockholm harbor. A weak gust of wind was enough to tilt the mighty ship to one side. Water immediately leaked in through the numerous gun ports and sealed the Vasa’s fate.

Incidentally, the captain is not to blame for the sinking. Rather, the shipbuilder is to blame, as the Vasa hardly differs from other warships of the 17th century, although it is more sturdily built and more heavily equipped than the other ships. Inadequate stability calculations were ultimately the reason for the failure of the bold experiment.

The salvage

The first salvage attempts began just a few days after the sinking of the Vasa. At least the valuable cannons were to be saved. Adventurers, treasure hunters and inventors set to work, but the attempts were unsuccessful and the treasures remained inaccessible.

It was not until 35 years after the sinking that the majority of the cannons were salvaged. After that, the Vasa was forgotten for centuries – the shame was too great for Sweden.

In 1956, the ship was rediscovered by engineer Anders Franzen after years of searching. For historians and museum visitors, it is a great stroke of luck that the Vasa sank in the middle of Stockholm, as wooden ships survive for centuries in the brackish waters of the Baltic Sea. As the water is not very salty, there is no shipworm here, which normally eats away at wood in a very short time.

In 1961, 333 years after the sinking, work began on salvaging the ship. Bringing the Vasa back to the surface is a major challenge for the engineers. In the end, it was decided to pull steel cables under the hull and attach them to water-filled pontoons. When these are pumped empty, they rise, tighten the steel cables and lift the ship from the bottom.

The method proved successful and the Vasa saw daylight again for the first time on April 24, 1961. Now the archeologists began the painstaking work of preserving the ship. The work took a total of 17 years.

The museum building

In 1981, the Swedish government decided to have an independent Vasa Museum built and organized an architectural competition, from which Marianne Dahlbäck and Göran Månsson emerged as the winners. Construction of the new building was carried out around a dry dock of an old shipyard and began in 1987. At the end of 1988, the Vasa was moved into the flooded dry dock under the half-finished building.

The Vasa Museum was officially opened in the summer of 1990. In the years that followed, the museum developed into one of the most popular museums in Sweden, replacing Skansen as the country’s most visited exhibition in 2017.

The visit

Today, visitors can admire the Vasa in its former glory in the 34-metre-high main hall. The ship is completely housed in the building, including the lower mast sections, bowsprit and rigging. Missing or badly damaged parts have been replaced, but not treated or painted, so that they stand out clearly from the original parts, which have darkened in the water over the centuries. According to the museum, 98% of the ship is original and only 2% has been added or replaced after salvage.

The ship can be viewed from six different levels, from the keel to the end of the stern quarter. Various objects and models illustrating the construction, discovery and restoration of the Vasa are displayed around the ship. There are also many exhibits on the history of Sweden in the 17th century, providing background information that led to the construction of the ship.

The four other museum ships are located in a harbor in front of the museum: The icebreaker Sankt Erik, the lightship Finngrundet, the speedboat Spica and the sea rescue boat Bernhard Ingelsson.