Look, we don’t need to introduce Trädgården to you. The club is a major part of every summer in Stockholm. But this year things have changed a little. The newly built apartments around Skanstull means that the club has had to rework its soundsystem to avoid conflict with these new neighbours. Which means that the 2018 incarnation of Trädgården has been totally renovated, with new dancefloors and a new, “revolutionary” soundsystem. We spoke to creative director Johanna Beckman to find out more ahead of the premiere this weekend.

To start off with, you’ve made some big renovations this year, so what are the main changes?

The main reason why we did this renovation is because last year we couldn’t play the music as loud as we wanted to, because we have new neighbours and we have to consider that and have to try to work with them and be co-operative and everything. So then we started to investigate what we could do, and we found this soundsystem, which isn’t new, but it hasn’t been used so much before. So we built this sound roof. I don’t have all the details, but it’s basically three hundred platforms, with the sound components in them, so it’s a big roof with the sound basically. It’s really good sound, so it’s going to be super interesting to work with that this year. And that opens it up for more creative dancefloor thinking. Not just when we have Daytime Sessions, but with a lot of other DJ bookings too.

So the way it works with regard to the sound is that it pushes the sound downwards towards the dancefloor?

Exactly. So when you stand under it it’s loud and the bass is there. But every ten metres you walk away, it drops ten decibels. So if you’re 100 metres away, you’re not going to hear it basically.

So it’s enclosed?

It’s very directed, and it has some dampening in the roof itself. It’s actually a Swedish invention, but the guy who invented it died and a guy from Australia took it over and has taken it forward, and this is the biggest roof he has ever built.

So outside of the soundsystem, what are the structural changes to the club, in terms of the layout?

Because of that, we’ve been restructuring everything. The sound roof, dancefloor will be where the restaurant used to be. So now that we have the restaurant inside it makes it easier for us in a way, instead of moving out between the seasons. But you will also be able to sit outside and eat as well, as we’ll have the backyard as well. So that’s a big shift in how you move around at Trädgården. The bars out in the Courtyard have been totally shifted. And we’re going to have a pizza place. We’re always had the burgers, we’re going to keep that, but we’re adding this really nice pizzeria with really nice chairs where you can sit and eat. There are going to be a lot more places where you can sit and chill. And at the centre of the yard there will be a tree, so you can see that there’s going to be much more focus on Trädgården and vegetation this year. That’s something you’re going to see.

Will there be vegan options for the pizza as well, like with Växthuset and the burgers?

Yeah, we’re going to continue with our plant-based thing. The pizza will be vegetarian but you can have vegan cheese if you want to.

I know you’ve been forced to make these changes, because of the sound problems with the neighbours. But is it exciting to get to change?

It’s super exciting! It’s interesting when you are forced to do something. We don’t know yet, but we believe this is going to be a much better place to be. You’re going to have a totally different sound, and we’ve really thought about how we want to change it and how it’s going to be structured. It opens it up for creativity, when it comes to what we want to present and what we want to book and how we want to do things basically.

Because you might not make the changes unless you’re forced to, but when you are forced to you have the option…

Of doing it properly. Exactly, and the feeling I have now is that that’s exactly what we have done.

You said in the press release that you wanted to widen Trädgården’s audience. How do you plan on doing that? You mentioned the Live Sessions last year as one of the ways of hitting that goal.

I think originally Trädgården was mostly for the people who lived on Söder. It still is, but it has grown all the time. I’m interested in this being as diverse a place as possible, and we want to present music and art and everything for people that like different types of genre. But the focus isn’t just on the same age group, the 21 to 35-40s. We’re also doing some stuff for kids this year, and having some concerts and theatre for kids. A lot of the people that came here in the beginning have now had kids, and they want to come to Trädgården, but they also want to bring their kids. So we’ve been seeing more and more people coming with kids. We’re going to focus this more on Saturdays, during the daytime. Now it’s going to be open from 14 every Saturday, with different types of content. In addition to the Live Sessions, we’re going to have other projects. We’re going to have Jazz shows, which can interest an older audience as well. It’s basically mixing up the bookings. And we’re doing the Växthusfesten concept, we’ll have that a few times, where the people that deliver our food will have markets.

So widening the musical bookings and adding more activities, that aren’t necessarily just for people that go out and drink and dance to music?

Yeah. We’ve started in the last few years to have training programmes, wellness stuff. So more yoga sessions, running club, bootcamps.

So it’s about evolving Trädgården into more of a social area that just a club?

Yeah. And we’re doing a project at the end of summer. Last year at Växthusfesten we invited a young symphony orchestra to perform, and they really liked being here and we liked the project. They played a Vivaldi piece then. So now we’ve extended that collaboration with some of them, and they’ve created this new group and we’re going to do a festival together called Gränslandet, in August. They’ll come with a whole symphony orchestra and take over all the spaces here, from daytime into night. Doing both really classical pieces that everybody knows, and also more contemporary stuff. And with collaborations with some pop artists, and we’re going to see if it’s possible for them to play with some of our DJs. So for me, it’s a super interesting and creative project to work with.

Regarding the bookings this year, what are you looking for this year, both in the club and Live Sessions line-ups?

We have you know five dance floors, so we have the possibility to be really broad, and try and do something for everyone. I’ve always liked that eclectic vibe, where you don’t know what you’re going to get. Röda Rummet, will be, as usual, the hip-hop, dancehall room. And we’ll have some from that genre playing outdoors too, especially when we have hip hop acts playing live, then it’s natural to book those sorts of DJs around them. Our Daytime Sessions will be techno house, so there’ll be a lot of that as well. As we couldn’t play music in Korkbaren, we moved that into the restaurant. There they’ll be a lot of indie-pop. So it’s going to be very diverse.

What about the Live Sessions?

It’s going to be spread from hip-hop to pop to psychedelic rock. We definitely keeping it a lot like last year, but we’re doing more shows. We’re trying to do a lot of different things.

Is it challenging to keep that balance in the bookings sometimes?

Yeah, definitely. And when it comes to a live summer, you can’t put two hip hop shows in a row and so on. But that’s what I love about my job, to find that balance, to work with the dramaturgy.

You’ve mentioned a couple of them already, but outside of the music and clubbing, what kind of events are planned?

We’re going to do a few cinema things. We’re focusing a lot more on Kyrkan this year. Not just for the Wednesday, Thursday shows, we’re also going to have a lot of people coming here and doing live pods, especially for Friday afterworks. And we’re showing the World Cup. All the games will be show, some may not attract a huge audience, so then we’ll have them in the burger place, but at Kyrkan the other times. For all the Swedish games of course.

If you could sum up your vision for what you want for Trädgården this year in a few sentences, how would you do it?

I definitely want everybody to feel really welcome here, and I want people to feel that we long for them to come, and I want people to have that wow feeling over the whole club. Especially with the new sound system, that you can be outside dancing to great music at high volume.

What can we expect from the opening night?

Our focus is definitely on showing off the sound. So we’ve invited Off The Meds, which is super interesting with three Stockholm DJs that’s semi-live, semi-DJ set. Then Johan Söderberg, who does Video Selector where he DJs music videos. And we want to show people that we’re putting in extra effort this year, and you’re going to feel that on the premiere night.

Trädgården opens for the season this weekend, May 4 and 5, with Off The Meds, Video Selector, Dos Óke, Evelina Åslin, Binnie Smalls, Anna Korsgren, Johanna Beckman & Jakob Grandin , Cinnamon Boys, Zorse & Tigons, Josef & Jelassi, Aïssa Diene, ShadedbyNature, Rasuul, Flord King & Kajsa Lindström, Johanna Schneider & Edvin Wikner, Cinnamon Boys w/ Friends and more.  

Photo: Märta Thisner