Sibbjäns

At the southern end of Gotland, surrounded by limestone walls, open alvar grasslands, ancient woodland and the Baltic Sea, Sibbjäns is a working farm where hospitality follows the rhythms of the land. Sheep, pigs, horses, hens and bees share the estate with kitchen gardens, meadows and wetlands, while restored farm buildings house simple, beautifully crafted rooms and a restaurant cooking largely according to what the farm and island can provide.

Story

Sibbjäns began not with plans for a hotel, but with two families questioning how they wanted to live.

Sanna and Pontus Rönn had started welcoming friends and friends-of-friends to a small B&B at their summer home on Gotland. Together with their neighbours, Jonas Nordlander and Kina Zeidler, they began imagining something more ambitious: a place where they could escape city life, grow food, keep animals and spend more time within the wild landscape of southern Gotland.

In 2021, the four friends bought an old horse farm close to their homes. Their original idea was modest — animals, a kitchen garden and a restaurant serving food from the farm — but it gradually evolved into a much bigger experiment in regenerative agriculture and hospitality.

Old farm buildings were carefully brought back to life, with traditional skills playing an important role. Gotland-born craftsman Erik “Domerarve” Larsson, described by the founders as an artisan of cultural heritage and one of the last of his kind, was given considerable creative freedom throughout the restoration.

Today Sibbjäns calls itself Sweden's first boutique farmstay: a hotel, restaurant and working farm designed around the belief that healthy soil, good food, biodiversity and hospitality should all be part of the same cycle.

Why we selected Sibbjäns

Food follows the land

The founders call their philosophy bonngastronomi — roughly, “farmer gastronomy” — an unpretentious approach in which menus respond to what is growing, being harvested and at its best at that moment.

The farm is designed to leave the landscape richer

Sibbjäns is restoring meadows, building soil health, managing scarce water carefully and creating habitats for wildlife across a landscape of farmland, woodland and wetlands.

Gotland's rural heritage is part of the design

Traditional limestone walls, restored agricultural buildings, vintage furniture and the work of local heritage craftspeople root Sibbjäns unmistakably in the island rather than generic Scandinavian design.

A traditional farmstay

Animals graze and fertilise the land, vegetables and herbs grow in living soil, rainwater is collected for irrigation and much of what appears on the table begins within the estate itself.

Local life & traditions

This is the land of Vino Nobile di Montepulciano, where family run cantine still age their wines in stone cellars beneath the town. Olive oil is pressed each autumn, tied to harvest rhythms that continue to shape daily life.

Montepulciano rises in sandstone and travertine, a Renaissance hill town proud of its traditions, from the Bravio delle Botti barrel race to summer evenings of opera and classical music. Terracotta roofs, wrought iron balconies and hand carved stone define the architecture, while kitchens centre on pici rolled by hand, Chianina beef and pecorino from nearby Pienza.

Life moves with the vineyard calendar, church bells and long Sunday lunches. Culture here is inherited, not performed.

Authentic experiences in the area

Join the harvest

Spend time in the kitchen garden picking what is ready before sharing a harvest lunch outdoors — experiencing the connection between soil, season and table firsthand.

Discover Gotland's truffle tradition

Visit during autumn, when Sibbjäns dedicates an entire weekend to Gotland truffles and one of the island’s most distinctive seasonal ingredients.

Eat the farm at the Farm Dinner

The signature six-course Gårdsmiddag is built around the best ingredients available from the farm at that moment, turning the agricultural year into the menu itself.

Explore southern Gotland by bike

Borrow one of Sibbjäns’ bicycles and head through the surrounding alvar, woodland, farmland and coastline, where limestone walls and traditional farmsteads reveal a quieter side of island life.

Protecting culture & land

Sibbjäns' ambition is unusually explicit: to leave the farm in better condition than they found it.

Across its landscape of meadows, wetlands, woodland and farmland, the team is restoring meadows, improving soil health and creating habitats intended to strengthen biodiversity. Livestock plays a role in maintaining the landscape, while planting incorporates species characteristic of Gotland's unusual lime-rich environment.

Water is particularly important on an island where freshwater can be scarce. Rain falling on the farm's roofs is channelled into ponds, where it can replenish groundwater and later irrigate the land. Hotel bathrooms use water-saving showers, while collected rainwater is also used for flushing toilets.

Culture is treated as something worth conserving too. Heritage plants from old Gotland farms grow in the recreated Gotland Garden, traditional limestone walls remain part of the landscape, and local craftspeople have helped restore the buildings using knowledge rooted in the island.

Location & surroundings

Sibbjäns sits near Burgsvik at the southern end of Gotland, surrounded by open countryside close to the Baltic coast.

This is a sparsely populated landscape of limestone alvar, old forests, farmland and beaches, with an ecology noticeably different from mainland Sweden. Further north, Visby’s medieval walls and Gothic ruins preserve the island’s history as an important Hanseatic trading centre.

Key details

Address

Vamlingbo Sibbjäns 102
623 31
Burgsvik, Gotland
Sweden

Getting here

By plane: Fly to Visby Airport, with onward travel by hire car, taxi or arranged transfer.

By ferry: Ferries connect Gotland with Nynäshamn and Oskarshamn on the Swedish mainland in approximately three hours.

From Visby: Sibbjäns lies in southern Gotland, so a car is the easiest way to explore the region.

Facilities

Farm-to-table restaurant & Farm Dinner

Kitchen gardens and working farm

Natural swimming pool

Wood-fired sauna

Outdoor gym

Yoga & massage

Guest bicycles

Hotel garden

More

Farmhouse with 9 individually designed en-suite rooms

Library & guest kitchen

Words from the four founders of Sibbjäns

“Our dream is simple — to share with others the tranquillity and beauty of Southern Gotland.”

Pontus & Sanna Rönn, Jonas Nordlander & Kina Zeidler, Founders

Every stay booked direct keeps value with the people of this place, so they can reinvest in culture, community and land

We believe travel should give back more than it takes; that it can protect cultures, not erode them.

That is why we connect you directly with each hotel’s own website. By booking direct, value remains in the hands of those who shape these places, enabling reinvestment into local culture, community, and land.