Get ready for Stockholm’s most colorful and love-filled event of the year – the Stockholm Pride Festival. This year it will take place from July 27th to August 1st. We have listed 10 very good reasons to visit the Stockholm Pride Festival:

1) HOMOPOLITANS During this summer’s Pride Festival, Strawberry is raising the rainbow flag and inviting you to warm up or cool down at our Stockholm hotels. Gather your friends, meet new people and enjoy a Strawberry signature Homopolitan before venturing out into the sea of color.

2) THE PRIDE PARADE Stockholm Pride is nothing less than Scandinavia’s largest Pride parade. In 2014 an incredible 600 000 people showed up to enjoy the beautifully decorated vehicles and the 60 000 glamorous participants parading through the streets of Stockholm. That’s a lot of love and a lot of fun. Many spectators make the parade an all-day event creating tiny Pride-camps with food, drinks and friends along the parade route. Sounds amazing? Bring a picnic basket and a couple of lounge chairs, come as you are or put on your bling – everyone is invited.

3) BREAKING UP Each year Stockholm Pride has a theme. This year’s theme is «Break up». Don’t worry – Stockholm Pride doesn’t want to break up with _love. _They want to break up with limiting norms, prejudices and hate. At Strawberry we don’t care who you are or who you love, so let’s break up together.

4) LEARNING MORE We live in a time of enlightenment. Whether you are a LGBT beginner or a pro, the Stockholm Pride Festival offers seminars, workshops and debates that will be both interesting and inspiring. Don’t miss out on the chance to expand your knowledge and horizon.

5) HAVING FUN For the ones seeking lighter and more entertaining input, Stockholm will throughout the whole celebration be filled with LGBT-themed exhibitions, movie screenings, plays, games and competitions. In addition to the official Pride events, bars and pubs around the city will be hosting their own fun and colorful events. Stay tuned on the Stockholm Pride Festival-page for updated festival programs.

6) THE DESIGNER DOG-TAG Each year a new designer creates a unique dog-tag-jewelry for the pride festival. The designer is selected through an annual design competition. Famous names like Jean Paul Gaultier, J.Lindeberg and Evfa Attling have been the designers behind the Stockholm Pride dog-tags in previous years. This fantastic collectible will be available in a limited number for the first eager people who buy their Stockholm Pride week pass. We are very excited for the reveal of this year’s designer. Are you?

7) COLORS Who doesn’t love colors? For one week, Stockholm turns in to the Swedish equivalent of a Brazilian carnival. Dig through your closet and find those super colorful clothes you never get to wear, put them on, wear them proudly and join the glitz and glam of the rainbow parade.

8) SUMMER IN STOCKHOLM When you’re not attending any of the events at Stockholm Pride Festival you have the opportunity to enjoy all the other summer experiences Stockholm has to offer. Why not start the day by visiting one of Stockholm’s many flea markets? Make an urban adventure out of it, hunting for treasures amongst old clothes and retro furniture. On warm summer days, do like the locals do: go for a swim. One of the hot spots for chillaxing and having a cool ocean bath is Långholmen where there also are beautiful walking paths. If you still have energy after sun set and want to enjoy the evening breeze, Trädgården has an exceptional club experience. Make sure not to get there too late, the club is crazy popular and the queue builds up quickly.

9) PRIDE AFTER PARTIES After a long day of music, dancing and parading there is no reason to stop – we invite you to continue the celebration at our place. Bring a friend or ten and dance the night away.

10) AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST: LOVE IS WORTH CELEBRATING To paraphrase some great love ambassadors: All we need is love. And there can’t be too much of it. So let’s preach it, spread it and celebrate it.