Hafnarborg

Hafnarborg is Hafnarfjörður's centre of culture and fine art, and it keeps the town's art collection. In 1983 Sverrir Magnússon, who owned the pharmacy, and his wife Ingibjörg Sigurjónsdóttir, a pharmacist, gave the town the house at Strandgata 34 with their collection of art and books, and their deed of gift asked that the house should be a home for concerts as well. The older part is one of Guðjón Samúelsson's first buildings, finished in 1921 as a pharmacy. The extension was built in the 1980s to drawings by Ingimar H. Ingimarsson, and the museum opened on 21 May 1988. Concerts are usually given in the main hall on the second floor, where a Fazioli grand piano has stood since January 1989. Lunchtime concerts with an emphasis on opera have been given since the autumn of 2003 under the pianist Antonía Hevesi, on the first Tuesday of the month through the winter, and Síðdegistónar, given over to jazz, has run on Fridays since the autumn of 2020. Hljóðön, a series of music from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, has run each spring and autumn since 2013, and Sönghátíð í Hafnarborg, a song festival, every summer since 2017. The collection holds some 1,600 works. The museum is open every day except Tuesday from noon to five, and admission is free.