Celebrating Midsummer in Terra Skåne

By Rachel Fellows

Published 04-June-2026

Partner content

On 15 June 2026, the Star Wine List of the Year Global Final will be held in the wineland of southern Sweden, hosted by Terra Skåne. Project Manager Linus Svensson explains what Terra Skåne is – and why our international finalists should be very excited about experiencing a Swedish Midsummer in the vineyards.

The Nobel Prize awards ceremony in December 2025 was a special occasion for many reasons, not least because it was the first time a Swedish still wine had been served at the event. During the banquet at Stockholm City Hall, 1,300 esteemed guests enjoyed the Immelen 2022 by Kullabergs Vingård alongside a main course of turbot stuffed with scallops and sugar kelp. It was a turning point.

Sweden may not be known, primarily, for its winemaking and yet wines produced in the southern province of Skåne are increasingly becoming recognised internationally. The Nobel dinner made sure of that. It also preceded the launch of a project, known as Terra Skåne, designed to promote Swedish wines both in their home country and across the world.

A team effort

Terra Skåne translates as “the earth of Skåne” and is a play on the term ‘terroir’ that is so central to the wine industry. It is a collaboration between four municipalities and 10 wineries in the northwestern part of Skåne County, which sits on Sweden’s southernmost tip.

The idea arose after a law passed in June 2025 allowed Swedish producers to start selling their wines directly to visitors – a notable shift for a country with a strict alcohol monopoly. Formally launched in January 2026, Terra Skåne is “both a marketing initiative to showcase Sweden as a wine country, and specifically Skåne as the primary wine district of Sweden, but it’s also a collaboration between wineries that are unheard of in Sweden (or at least were before), because here it’s so new with wine and people haven’t really gathered around to start a collaboration in such a concerted or broad-reaching way before,” according to Project Manager Linus Svensson.

These “multiple actors within the sector” are working to increase the profile of Skåne’s wines, and boost tourism to the area. And we know a group of sommeliers soon to descend on Skåne: the finalists in the Star Wine List of the Year Global Final 2026.

On 15 June, Star Wine List will bring approximately 150 guests from around the world to Skåne. They comprise sommelier teams who have already won Gold Stars for their wine lists in competitions held in their respective countries or broader regions, and are now vying for global Gold Stars in the grand finale of this season’s awards tour, which has been running since September 2025. Previous Global Finals have been held in Stockholm, Vienna and London but, since Sweden is where Star Wine List was founded, there is something rather special about introducing our international network of wine professionals to this fast-emerging winemaking destination.

Svensson works for the Höganäs Municipality, which has partnered with Ängelholms Näringsliv AB, Båstad Turism & Näringsliv, and the City of Helsingborg, and the participating wineries, to strengthen the image – and understanding – of Swedish wine.

“The municipality saw a possibility,” he says. “It’s like, okay, what do you think about when you think about Swedish wine? You just think ‘Swedish wine’ and no one has really taken a position so far. We want to be that position.” After securing government funding, the municipalities approached the wineries. “And now we’re here!”

The goal is promotional rather than bureaucratic – Terra Skåne will not be creating laws or pushing for PDOs, but championing the wineries and helping them spread word of their wines and estates across the rest of Sweden, and the world.

Aside from the terroir link in the name Terra Skåne, the term also nods to the wider role that the region’s produce plays.

“It’s a bad translation but ‘the Skåne earth’ is a famous expression in Sweden, because Skåne produces around a third of all food produced in the country, and two-thirds of its fruit, vegetables and berries. Additionally, around 85% of Sweden’s fruit orchards are located in Skåne. We’re in the south, we are in the climate zone one, so it’s a lot easier to grow crops here than in the north. And especially now, when many people talk about the self-sufficiency of countries when it comes to food for various reasons, then Skåne has become a very important part of that because we produce so much of Swedish food. So ‘the Skåne earth’ – what grows from Skåne – was famous before and that could also be an angle that we try to expand on, not only from a wine perspective but other perspectives of what grows from the earth as well.”

A Midsummer Global Final

The Terra Skåne team is excited to welcome the Star Wine List of the Year global finalists as “the root” of the wine industry. “If you get to the sommeliers, you get to the restaurants and everyone who’s talking about wine. And then you reach masses of people but in a more trustworthy way,” says Svensson. “And I’ve noticed from working with Star Wine List that we very quickly have taken that position as a trustworthy initiative, not just some random marketing initiative. So that’s been a really, really big thing.”

Guests in June have two reasons to get excited, according to Svensson. “It’s a chance to showcase what Swedish wine has to offer, but also to make everyone experience Swedish Midsummer, which is probably something that we are most famous for in Sweden. And that’s an experience that you will never forget.

“Midsummer is the highlight of every year, I would say, because it’s the longest day and it’s about celebrating the light of the longest day – and in most of Sweden, the sun doesn’t even set. So it’s connected to a good party with close friends and family, and it’s the most fun day of the year.”

This link to the daylight hours gives added poignancy to a wine-focused crowd, since these long summer days provide excellent growing conditions in the vineyards. “We’ll be celebrating Midsummer as a Swedish tradition, but also showcasing that this actually reflects in the way you grow grapes here,” Svensson says.

The area covered by Terra Skåne is currently about 50 by 50 kilometres, in the northwest of Skåne County. In the future, there are hopes to build an official tourist route between the vineyards, working with the government to create scenic roads, and one day to expand the project to the entirety of the south.

This won’t be the last you hear about Swedish wine.