Summer in Scandinavia: A Couple of Days in Copenhagen

Copenhagen is one of our favourite places in the world. We visited the Danish capital for the first time together in 2018 and could not wait to return. While planning our summer holiday and choosing another Scandi city to discover – Stockholm – we felt that a few days in Copenhagen would allow us to revisit some of our favourite places and explore those we had missed in 2018. Subsequently, we spent three days in Copenhagen before heading north to Sweden. During the first week of July, Julie boarded an early morning flight from London and arrived in Copenhagen for mid-morning. Arran met her later that evening after attending a family commitment in America.

Julie made the most of her day alone, beginning her explorations in quite an incredible museum. For us, 2024 was the year of amazing art galleries and Copenhagen continued to deliver on that front. Within five minutes of dropping her bags, Julie was transported to Ancient Egypt, Rome and Greece; the wonderful world of French Impressionism and the Golden Age of Danish Art at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, which is commonly known as Glyptoteket.

This incredible space is comprised of three distinct buildings designed by three of the great names in Danish architecture: Vilhelm Dahlerup, Hack Kampmann and Henning Larsen. At different stages in the museum’s history, each architect contributed a new construction that together combined to create the Glyptoteket you can visit today. As you enter the museum, you’re met with quite the surprise: a domed-roof glasshouse that casts dappled shadows and honey-coloured light across the central space. Known as the Winter Garden, it is quite the setting to begin your journey back in time to explore the very best of art through the ages. From romantic glasshouse full of foliage to a Roman atrium, the next room on the tour provides another moment of speechlessness. This hall – with its bright red walls framing columns, stone statues and a striking yellow tiled floor – is fashioned as the courtyard of a Roman villa. It is not something you expect to see in an art museum. On the lower levels you can see antiquities, archaeological discoveries and objects from ancient civilisations. The Egyptian galleries are particularly interesting as to see the mummies you descend a lowly lit staircase, almost as if you’re entering a tomb. The ground floor rooms also boast an amazing collection of marble sculptures, including a wonderfully sensitive depiction of young love in Idyll (1912-14) by Norwegian-Danish sculptor Stephan Sinding.

Julie especially loved the galleries on the upper floors which focus on paintings from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. An exhibition titled ‘After Nature’, inspired by author Josefine Klougart’s essay of the same name, was very interesting. In After Nature, Klougart wrote: ‘Nature no longer exists. That wild, untamed nature, untouched by human beings, is a thing of the past’. Using the Glyptoteket’s collection of landscape paintings, the exhibition delves into humanity’s relationship with nature as seen through the prism of art, exploring the beauty and disappearance of nature in our modern reality. Another excellent temporary exhibition was provided by Palestinian artist-duo Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Rahme. Their multi-layered media installation – ‘The song is the call and the land is calling’ – explores the profound connection between cultural heritage, identity, belonging, loss and displacement. In the rooms dedicated to Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, a few paintings stood out, including several by Pierre Bonnard. The Dining Room (1925) is a particularly charming scene of the artist’s wife giving their dog a treat. Lunch in the Garden (1909) also captures an idyllic moment of domestic bliss. After exploring the galleries, you can continue onto the roof where you’re greeted with excellent views of the city’s skyline and the tallest rides of Tivoli. The visit concluded in the lovely museum café. An earl grey tea with a buttery scone topped with whipped sour cream and tart blueberry jam was enjoyed whilst people watching and taking in the breathtaking views of the Winter Garden as visitors basked under palm trees and hibiscus plants and watched the koi fish dart through the waters of the fountain.

After the Glyptoteket, Julie took a leisurely stroll through the picturesque streets of Copenhagen, making sure to see two of the oldest streets in the Old Town: Snaregade and Magstræde. Both were created at the start of the sixteenth-century, and you can still walk along their original cobblestones today. They’re both enchanting reminders of bygone ages and their distinctive sunset-toned façades add a touch of colour to any grey day.

Other places to note whilst exploring the old town is the distinctive Rundetårn, or Round Tower, an architectural icon of the city. Inspired by both German Renaissance castles and ancient structures, including the Tower of Babel, it was built as an astronomical observatory in 1642. You can ascend its interior helical slope right to the top for views over Copenhagen. The spiral ramp winds 7½ times around the tower’s hollow core and, as the only one of its kind in Denmark, is one of the country’s most famous buildings. A more unusual cultural landmark just two streets over from the Round Tower is Sømods Bolcher, a family-run company that has been making handmade sweets in Copenhagen since 1891. If you visit this charming shop, you can not only pick up some delicious souvenirs but also watch artisans continue to make confectionary using traditional methods. Julie, who studies food history, is always interested in finding little pockets of social and cultural history in the places we visit. During World War Two, when there were many restrictions on food, people would crowd Sømod’s in the hope of purchasing candies when news travelled that there had been a delivery of rationed sugar.

Julie then headed to the Botanical Gardens, a ten minute walk from the Round Tower. Copenhagen’s Botanical Garden is an oasis of calm and nature in an already peaceful city. The parkland, filled with rockeries, hidden gardens, a pond and more than 13,000 species of plants, is free to enjoy. The most famous landmark of the garden is the Palm House, and a small entrance fee gives you access to a collection of historical glasshouses dating back to the Victorian era. Its architecture is particularly distinctive, inspired by the Crystal Palace built for the Great Exhibition in London in 1851. Inside, you can immerse yourself in the world of exotic and rare plants. At the centre of the glasshouse, which is the tropical rainforest zone, a spiral staircase lifts you up onto a platform that provides a circular route around the large dome of the Palm House. From here, you get a great view of the large cycads, giant bamboo shoots and other flora and fauna housed here.

The real highlight, however, is the Butterfly House. Included in your entry to the Palm House, you can step inside a world of vibrant and lively butterflies fluttering among pineapple plants, lantana and passion flowers. Their vivid wings, decorated in all sorts of beautiful markings and colours, flicker right by you as you wander through. Julie stayed a while taking in these magnificent creatures.

A very short walk from the Botanical Garden is the Statens Museum for Kunst (SMK). This is the National Gallery of Denmark and the country’s largest art museum. We visited in 2018 during a quiet afternoon and were able to enjoy many of the galleries – which display an outstanding collection of both Danish and international art – alone. We loved the SMK’s collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, Fauvist, Expressionist and Cubist paintings provided by Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Amedeo Modigliani and André Derain. The so-called ‘Sculpture Street’ – a glass-covered, elongated connection between the SMK’s historic main building and a modern extension – houses a selection of Danish sculpture spanning 150 years. Its light, airy and dramatic, providing a lovely place to sit and reflect.

Not far from both the SMK and the Botanical Garden is Kongens Have, or the King’s Garden. It is the oldest park in central Copenhagen and in the north-western corner the beautiful Rosenborg Slot stands proud. This romantic castle with its high tower and red brick walls was originally built between 1606 and 1633 as a pleasure palace for King Christian IV. The castle houses some of Denmark’s greatest cultural treasures, including the crown jewels and royal regalia. The rooms testify to pomp, pageantry and unbridled wealth, in addition to the adoration and affection shown by Christian IV to his so-called summerhouse. So great was Christian IV’s love for Rosenborg that on his deathbed at Frederiksborg he commanded that he be transported by sleigh to the castle to spend his final days there. There are many highlights to see on the tour, including one of the world’s finest Venetian glass collections; a rather impressive Baroque-style marble room and a room full of mirrors modelled on the Palace of Versailles. During our first visit to Copenhagen, we spent a couple of hours enjoying the castle’s magnificent collections and learning about Danish royal history, which we followed up with a tour of Amalienborg Palace.

Amalienborg is the seat of the Danish monarchy. Comprised of four identical buildings still used by the royal family, the Amalienborg Museum is situated in one of these palaces. Inside, you have access to the private interiors of the most recent kings and queens, along with an exhibition explaining the history of the monarchy and its many traditions. Independently, the four palaces are, architecturally, unremarkable. Nevertheless, their grandeur is cemented by Frederik’s Church, popularly known as the Marble Church, which lies beautifully in line with two of the palace’s buildings. The church’s Rococo architecture is crowned with the largest ecclesiastical dome in Scandinavia. If you don’t fancy visiting the museum, you must stay to watch the daily ceremony of the Changing of the Guard. The Royal Life Guards march from Rosenborg Castle to Amalienborg Palace and the ceremony takes place at noon in the palace’s square.

The afternoon called for a sweet treat and back in 2018 we visited the sweetest shop on Store Kongensgade (a five minute walk from Amalienborg) selling the famous Danish ice cream, Hansens. We shared a delicious liquorice flavoured scoop, delightfully served in blue and white striped casing. Unfortunately, the shop has now closed its doors, so Julie headed back to the hotel via Copenhagen’s most iconic view: Nyhavn.

The idyllic charm of the city is encapsulated in the brightly coloured gabled buildings of Nyhavn that date back to the seventeenth-century. Stretching from Kongens Nytorv to the Inner Harbour, it is lined with bars, cafes and restaurants and the canal harbours many historical wooden ships. Nyhavn was constructed by King Christian V from 1670 to 1675 using the labour of Danish soldiers and Swedish prisoners of war from the Dano-Swedish War. It is a gateway from the sea to the old inner city at Kongens Nytorv, where ships handled cargo and fishermen’s catch. It was notorious for beer, sailors, and prostitution and even the famous Danish fairytale author, Hans Christian Andersen, lived at No. 67 for 18 years. The oldest house (No. 9) dates from 1681. It’s also a good place to join a boat tour of the canals. We did this back in 2018 and enjoyed seeing the sights from the water, including the Little Mermaid sculpture.

Julie then returned to the hotel for a rest and to wait for Arran’s arrival. We stayed at the luxurious Villa Copenhagen, which has a rooftop pool and sauna. Our evenings were spent relaxing and rejuvenating in their spa facilities, sipping Aperol spritzes with views of Tivoli’s highest rides. On our first night, tired from our day of travel, we decided that we would indulge in a decadent dinner of room service. We devoured salty fries, pâté and charcuterie while planning the following day’s excursion.

One of the reasons we were so keen to return to Copenhagen was because we wanted to visit Frederiksborg. Plucked straight from a fairytale, this Renaissance castle dates back to the early-seventeenth century and the reign of King Christian IV. We wanted to arrive as close to opening time as possible to make the most of this impressive royal palace. It takes just over an hour to get to there, so we jumped on the A line from Copenhagen central station and disembarked at Hillerød, where we boarded a bus which took us right to the castle’s entrance.

Frederiksborg Castle is situated on three small islets in Hillerød. A stately property existed on the grounds from the sixteenth-century when King Frederik II acquired Hillerødsholm Manor in 1560 and constructed the first part of Frederiksborg. Yet, at the start of the seventeenth-century, his son – Christian IV – demolished the castle, before building the largest Renaissance complex in the Nordic region. It was built as an emblem of status, taste and monarchical power. Subsequently, the castle is opulently adorned with symbolic and decorative elements befitting of one of Europe’s most powerful royal families. When you arrive, its grandeur is palpable. You are greeted by the mint, marigold and maroon shades of the spectacular architecture and the grandeur continues inside as you walk through some of the palace’s most impressive rooms, including the Chapel that boasts a striking gold, silver and ebony altarpiece and the Marble Gallery in the King’s Wing. Not only does the castle offer an incredibly rich tour of its many rooms, since 1878 Frederiksborg has housed the Museum of National History and the Danish Portrait Gallery, presenting 500 years of Danish history through portraits, history paintings, furniture, applied art and photographs. We spent several hours inside Frederiksborg taking in all its history.

While the weather was relatively damp on arrival, by the time we had finished the tour of the castle we were treated to glorious sunshine and blue skies. We first stopped for lunch. You must make time for Rabarbergaarden Slottet; this was the most wonderful restaurant. They specialise in local and seasonal produce, so we shared a plate of local cheeses with fig jam and bread topped with smoked mackerel. We enjoyed these small dishes with a glass of orange wine.

After lunch, we wandered through the sweeping grounds and watched families of geese float around the moat, known as Castle Lake. One of the most extraordinary parts of the garden is the Baroque Garden. Designed and planted in the 1720s under the instruction of King Frederik IV, manicured hedges, symmetrical lines and perfectly pruned topiary guide your eye and running through the centre is a cascade of water that concludes in Castle Lake. This design, typical of the eighteenth-century, represented mankind’s control of nature. However, another area of the garden focuses on romantic landscaping, fashionable in the nineteenth-century. Here, King Frederik VII devised meandering paths, waterways, bushy shrubbery and rambling roses to celebrate nature’s beauty, a contrast to the straight lines and sharp angles of the Baroque Garden. This romantic landscape is further enriched by the so-called Badstueslot – or Bath House – which was built in 1580. This beautiful miniature chateau is one of the surviving features of Frederiksborg’s original royal history.

Our day concluded with dinner at Delphine, a restaurant that embraces Mediterranean flavours. We shared numerous plates of delicious food, including anchovies, calamari and burrata and tomato salad.

The perfect evening activity is Tivoli Gardens. This charming place was founded in 1843 and is the third-oldest operating amusement park in the world. If amusement park rides aren’t your thing, just walking around Tivoli is a magical experience thanks to the site’s warm-toned and twinkling lights; beguiling architecture inspired by Eastern aesthetics, and old-world charm. While Julie doesn’t mind rollercoasters, they’re not Arran’s first-choice activity, but during our visit in 2018 we chose one ride to do together: the Himmelskibet. Translated as Star Flyer and once dubbed the world’s tallest carousel, you sit in swing chairs and are transported up into the air where you’re treated to unrivalled views over Copenhagen as you spin around. Adorned with stars, quadrants, telescopes, and planets, this celestial carousel pays homage to the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe. An evening at Tivoli must finish with a sugar rush from toffee apples coated in desiccated coconut and fluffy pink candyfloss. While we did not make it to Tivoli this time, we watched their evening firework display from the comfort of our hotel room.

One of our favourite places to visit while in Copenhagen is the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. The gallery is a forty minute train ride north of the city on the Zealand coast. We boarded a mid-morning train from Copenhagen central station and disembarked at Humlebæk. From the station, we walked the twenty minute route to the gallery. The Louisiana Museum of Art was founded in 1958. Its founder, Knud W. Jensen, wanted to create a museum where Danes could see modern art, which until then had no special place in Danish museums. Today, it continues to exhibit, collect and research both internationally renowned and relatively underrepresented contemporary and modern artists. On arrival, it looks small and unassuming but do not be deceived, its expansive and architecturally innovative. You enter through the nineteenth-century white villa that originally inhabited the site. From here, you’re able to explore several additional buildings that are considered a major work of Danish modernist architecture. These wings are connected by several glass corridors that offer great views of the sculpture garden, landscaped areas and even the Øresund. On a clear day you can see Sweden.

We began our tour by exploring the hyperrealism of Franz Gertsch. This is not usually an art style that appeals to us, but Gertsch’s art really is incredible. There is a fuzzy and photorealistic quality to his work, and they reminded us of photographs taken on film. His huge woodcuts are also extraordinary. From the 1980s, Gertsch began transforming his photographic sources into woodcuts. These, however, are not ordinary woodcuts, Gertsch’s are on a monumental scale. We loved the woodcuts depicting grasses, trees and the natural world. In the North Wing many excellent pieces by Alberto Giacometti and Louise Bourgeois sympathetically cohabit the space. Bourgeois’s iconic Spider Couple is framed spectacularly by the huge window that overlooks the museum’s landscape. In the museum’s South Wing, Yayoi Kasama’s much loved installation, Gleaming Lights of the Souls, is on display. You enter a dark room where the walls and ceilings are covered in mirrors, the floor is a reflecting pool and hundreds of spherical light bulbs pulsate and change colour. We spent 28 hours in a virtual queue to obtain tickets for Kusama’s ‘Infinity Mirror Rooms’ exhibition at Tate Modern a few years ago, maybe we should have just headed to Copenhagen…

A real highlight of the visit was discovering the work of Chaïm Soutine. Operating in Paris in the early half of the twentieth-century, Soutine found inspiration beyond the general preoccupations of the day. Rather than Cubism, Dadaism and Surrealism – modern art movements finding bright expression in Europe’s art capital – Soutine turned to art history. Using the masterpieces of the past on display at the Louvre, Soutine found inspiration from the still lifes, figures and landscapes of painters like Jean Fouquet, Rembrandt, Jean Siméon Chardin and Gustave Courbet. His work reminded us of other contemporaries, such as Amedeo Modigliani and Marc Chagall, names far more famous in the world of art. However, we were so struck and moved by Soutine’s subjects, painterly style and classical inspirations that we hope more retrospective exhibitions of his work pop-up around Europe. Around seventy paintings comprised the exhibition, including portraits of ordinary people – like waiters – who found themselves on the fringes of society, just as Soutine himself did for most of his life. We loved some of his still lifes, including Still Life with Herrings (1915-16) and Red Gladioi (1919). Soutine’s biography adds an additional layer to his artwork. He was raised in extreme poverty in an Orthodox Jewish family in Belarus. His parents allowed him to attend drawing lessons in Minsk and later he moved to Lithuania, enrolling in Vilnius’s art school. He moved to Paris in 1913, which at the time was the capital of the European avant-garde scene and a meeting point for many exiled artists, especially from Eastern Europe. His life in Paris, even after gaining recognition and a more stable financial position, was characterised by restlessness. As stateless and Jewish, his reality became extremely uncertain during the German occupation of Paris. He lived his final years predominantly in hiding. He died in 1943 after returning to Paris to seek medical treatment for a stomach ulcer. The curation of Louisiana’s exhibition – titled ‘Against the Current’ – was both moving and fascinating, a fabulous tribute to a little-known Jewish artist from Belarus who lit up Montmartre’s Expressionist art scene and pushed the boundaries of art.

Beyond the gallery walls are the gardens. There are nearly fifty works of art in the green areas cocooning the building of Louisiana, including works by Henry Moore, Max Ernst, Roy Lichtenstein, Richard Serra and Alexander Calder. We particularly liked Alicja Kwade’s Pars Pro Toto, eight large, rounded stone sculptures that lie on the grass like fallen planets.

A visit to Louisiana’s café must be included in your day. Delicious food combines with a breathtaking view over the Sound and the gallery’s terrace, home to some of Alexander Calder’s imposing sculptures. The menu is carefully curated with ingredients not ordinarily found in art gallery kitchens and then artistically presented on studio pottery. Subsequently, the café becomes a key part of the whole avant-garde experience. During our visit the weather fluctuated between beautiful blue skies and torrential rain, but we managed to secure a spot outside during a period of sunshine to take in the views of the Sound while we enjoyed a tasty lunch. We finished our meal with a strawberry cake and its deliciously glossy red glaze resembled the sort of button you’re told never to push. We loved the playful and whimsy touches, which enhanced an already fantastic art gallery experience. After a final walk through several of the galleries, we headed back to Copenhagen. While waiting at Humlebæk station, we were treated to a rainstorm of biblical proportions. As Brits, we felt right at home.

If you continue travelling north up this coastline, you’ll reach Helsingør, the final stop on the trainline that also takes you to Humlebæk. This day trip from Copenhagen is well worth doing as you can visit one of Northern Europe’s finest Renaissance castles: Kronborg. This UNESCO World Heritage Site has a dramatic history; it is famous as the setting of William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet. From the turrets you can see views over the Sound to Helsingborg in Sweden and whilst exploring the castle’s rooms you learn all about the kings and queens who called Kronborg home and controlled the water in the narrowest point between Sweden and Denmark. The castle’s foundations date back to 1420, but its current iteration is the work of King Frederik II between 1574 and 1585. Built in the sumptuous Renaissance style, the castle was a symbol of wealth and power. Kronborg was ravaged by fire in 1629, and King Christian IV reconstructed the castle with extensive Baroque decorations. From 1785 until 1923, the castle was used by the military. Visiting Kronborg, today, however, will transport you back to its glory years during the reigns of Frederik II and Christian IV. A piece of British literary history is also within Kronborg’s walls. One of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedies – Hamlet – tells the story of Danish Prince Hamlet and his tragic fate at Elsinore Castle. Kronborg is immortalised as Elsinore in the play, and this is the anglicised version of Helsingør, the city where Kronborg stands. While no one knows for sure whether Shakespeare ever visited the castle, he certainly heard the rumours of the decadent lifestyle of the court. After touring the castle, you must venture down to the casemates to say hello to the mythical figure of Holger Danske. The myth of Holger Danske goes back almost 1000 years! This legendary hero, currently asleep in stone, will wake when Denmark faces danger. Until then, however, he rests peacefully on his stone throne.

After a tour of the castle, you must finish your visit in Helsingør at Brostræde Is. It’s the oldest ice cream shop in the city and they sell the most delicious homemade ice cream in freshly baked cones. They keep their flavours simple and classic. You can choose between vanilla, nougat, strawberry, chocolate and pistachio and if you’re looking for an extra flourish, add whipped cream and jam!

Another location from the archives is Islands Brygge. We spent our afternoon here on returning to the city after visiting the Louisiana Museum of Art in 2018. Situated in Copenhagen’s former industrial harbour, Islands Brygge is now a lively hangout. The area’s harbour bath is a free open air swimming venue where you can take a refreshing dip with the city’s skyline in view. You can also marvel at the daring swimmers diving from the high platforms. While the weather was not good enough this time round to take a dip in the cool waters of the harbour, it was a real highlight of our previous trip and one we would recommend making time for.

Our final dinner of this short but sweet trip was at Selma. This small but excellent restaurant offers an exciting tasting menu that captures the essence of smørrebrød. We accompanied our meal with schnapps, the traditional drink pairing with smørrebrød. We let our waiter choose the flavour profile, and so we sipped browned butter schnapps between our eight courses. It was the perfect culinary conclusion to our short trip to Copenhagen. After dinner we caught the sun setting over Nyhavn and the sparkling lights of the nightlife illuminate the harbour.