Part of Drottningholm’s fascination is the degree to which it remains unchanged. Public lobbies and dressing rooms retain their original design. Scenery is old painted flats, and everything is still operated manually. In the 18th century, the theater was a hive of activity. The back of the building housed 150 performers and crew members, who lived there when the royal family was nearby and were expected to create a new production every two weeks to please King Gustav III. To meet this heavy demand, they had approximately 30 different settings (heaven, hell, clouds, gardens, drawing rooms, a grotto, an abbey, a battlefield, a storm at sea ...), kept in the wings and ready to deploy as needed in every new work. They used candles for light, placing colored glass in front of them to create different moods. The height of the candle determined the duration of the show.

At Drottningholm the stage and the auditorium are the same length (66 feet), creating an incredible intimacy. In the past, the room could accommodate only 250 audience members because of the size of women’s dresses. Today it fits 450 people cozily. And while there’s now electrical lighting, 15 of the original settings are still used for performances, each one raised and lowered manually by the stage crew. All the ropes and rigging backstage bring to mind a schooner.

King Gustav III also built an opera house in Stockholm toward the end of the 18th century, though the current Royal Swedish Opera replaced it in 1898. The public rooms are ornate, and the auditorium has a dark opulence more suited to Paris than Scandinavia. The small coat check, with an attendant, would almost make you think it never snows in Sweden. With 1,150 seats, this opera house was the biggest in the Nordic nations until the new Finnish National Opera opened in 1993, but sight lines and acoustics are variable. Yet many Swedes cling to this theater and its ghosts, with their memories of great performances past. To me, however, the greatest attraction of this building is the food: two chic cafés and two of Stockholm’s best restaurants are housed under its roof. No opera house in the world matches the dining experience here, and only Madrid and Munich come close.

It seems only a matter of time before Stockholm, with its fabulous supply of native singing talent, will join its Nordic siblings and build a modern theater of indisputably beautiful design. And I’ll go there, not simply to worship at the newest operatic shrine but also to answer the question that seems to differentiate the various Scandinavian opera houses: Where will I check my coat? "North Stars" originally appeared in the Fall 2008 issue of Culture+Travel. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Culture+Travel's Fall 2008 Table of Contents.