History
Fryshuset was founded in 1984 as a result of joint efforts by the YMCA/YWCA of Stockholm (Swedish abbreviation KFUK-KFUM) and a couple of volunteers, among them Anders Carlberg who has always been considered as Fryshuset's founding father and who later became its CEO. The name Fryshuset literally means the cold storage building in Swedish, since the center was first housed in a former cold storage facility at Södermalm in the south of Stockholm.
At the outset, sports and music were the sole activities, but social issues made their way into the house as a reflection of young people's needs.
In the summer of 1986, when violent riots occurred between teenage groups in Stockholm, the Swedish government asked Fryshuset to help relieve the situation. Fryshuset launched a campaign, touring the country lecturing on constructive alternatives to violence.
Today
Since then Fryshuset has grown into a large center and meetingplace for social projects, education and interests. Fryshuset runs several schools (for example the high school Fryshusets Gymnasium, in Stockholm) and programs for vocational training, seminars and conferences, courses in theatre, music, and sports as well as events, concerts, parties and discothèques, a skateboard park, a basketball arena for 08 Stockholm Human Rights. Parts of Fryshuset's activities are running in Gothenburg and Malmö – Sweden's second and third largest cities. Fryshuset employs around 500 people and receives around 40,000 visitors every month.
Fryshuset is a foundation headed by the YMCA of Stockholm. Public funding covers around 5% of the activities, the rest is financed by grants, endowments and fees for services such as educational and social programs (fees that are not paid by young people or individual clients but by sponsors and partners).
Stockholm, Sweden
Arenan is the bigger venue in Fryshuset.
When serving as a concert hall, it has a capacity of max 3500 pers. The hall can be split up (with movable “cloth walls” hanging from the roof) to fit smaller audiences, down to less than 1000 persons.
The hall has three entrances. The main entrance from the front of the house, the lower floor entrance (same entrance as to the smaller venue Klubben, but then you have to walk up the stairs to get to Arenan) and the back entrance. Nowadays, the back entrance is used quite seldom though. On smaller gigs, only the lower entrance (at Klubben) is used.
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