Copenhagen

Noma Closed at the End of 2024 and Copenhagen’s Food Scene Got Better

That sentence will annoy some people, but it is defensible. Noma closed its restaurant operation at the end of 2024 to become a food innovation lab – and the decade-long gravitational pull it exerted on the city’s dining culture is now redistributed. Jorndaer in Gentofte and Geranium (Rene Redzepi’s original before Noma) both hold three Michelin stars. ESSE, opened by former Noma chef Matt Orlando in Nordhavn, brought a different philosophy: sustainability, accessibility, and flavour without performance. A third of international tourists visit Denmark specifically for the food. The city now has 30 Michelin stars spread across 19 restaurants. The number keeps growing.

Copenhagen is also, by the numbers, one of the most bike-friendly cities on earth: four out of five residents own a bicycle, the cycle lanes are wider than most cities’ pavements, and the bridges across the harbour pulse with a quiet river of commuters in office clothes at rush hour. That detail tells you more about the city’s actual priorities than any architecture survey.

The Essential Sights

Nyhavn’s 17th-century harbour of painted townhouses was the sailors’ quarter for centuries. Hans Christian Andersen lived at numbers 20, 67, and 18 at different times in his life. Go early in the morning or at dusk for the best light and the least crowding.

Tivoli Gardens opened in 1843 and is directly credited as an inspiration for Disneyland – Walt Disney visited in 1951 and came home with ideas. The wooden roller coasters, peacocks wandering the paths, concert halls, and 40 restaurants operate at their best at dusk in summer and during the extraordinary Christmas market season. The mix of functions in one park is still unusual anywhere in the world.

Christiansborg Palace on Slotsholmen island holds Parliament, the government, and the Supreme Court in one building, plus the Royal Reception Rooms with the Queen’s Tapestries covering 1,000 years of Danish history. The tower viewpoint is free and gives the best city panorama from above. The medieval ruins excavated beneath the palace are accessible by separate ticket.

Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, beer baron Carl Jacobsen’s gift to the city, holds classical, Egyptian, and 19th-century French sculpture in a building with a Winter Garden at its core. One of the most undervisited world-class museums in Europe, and it is genuinely world-class.

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebaek, one hour north by train, occupies a bluff overlooking the Oresund Strait with sculpture gardens and terraces. Give it a full day. It is among the most beautifully sited museums in Europe.

Eating

Smorrebrod – open-faced rye-bread sandwiches, properly made with pickled herring, roast beef, or egg and shrimp – is the correct Danish lunch. Wienerbrod from a proper bakery in the morning. A hot dog from a polsevogne cart, grilled and assembled with onions, remoulade, and mustard, is the legitimate afternoon snack that Danes eat without irony.

Torvehallerne Glasmarked at Norrebro is the best food hall: two iron-and-glass market halls of stalls and counters. For evening eating, Vesterbro’s Meatpacking District (Kodbyen) is still the main hub for interesting restaurants.

Practical Notes

The metro runs 24 hours. Tap water is excellent. Almost everything accepts contactless payment. The Copenhagen Card covers transport and major museums. CopenHill, the BIG-designed waste-to-energy power plant with a ski slope on its roof, is one of those specifically Copenhagen things worth at least seeing from outside.

Day trips: Kronborg Castle at Helsingore (Shakespeare’s Elsinore, 45 minutes by train) and Frederiksborg Castle at Hillerod (the most spectacular Renaissance palace in Scandinavia, 40 minutes) are both worth a half-day.