In the 10,000 years since the Arctic icecap receded sufficiently to enable human inhabitation of the land we now know as Sweden, the curiously creative nation has gifted the world with the likes of Beowulf, Strindberg, Bergman and, well, Abba.
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For the 21st century, Sweden has a new cultural export: style. After the success of the first Swedish Style festival in Japan two years ago, the Scandinavians are back at it this fall with an ambitious program featuring everything from fashion and design to music and dance. The thread that runs through the disparate elements is, of course, style -- the sense that Swedes do it differently, that Swedes do it stylishly.