Italy-raised landscape architect Stellan Mansfeld return after years in Canada to his Swedish coastal countryside birth town for a job with local estate owner Gustaf Hagen, who plans to retire there and leave his Stockholm law firm to son Jens and his fiancée, town-girl Clara Stellingbosch. Stellan however falls in love with Clara and helps her save brat sister Natalie's bacon after eco-cahoot Mikael's illegal actions. Stellan's grandmother Maria confides his late mother's traumatic and her own secret past in a complicated affair concerning a maverick painter's work Stellan finds in the Hagen mansion.