9 Coolest Parks in Copenhagen
1. Tivoli Gardens
2. The King’s Garden
3. The Botanical Garden
4. Ørstedsparken
5. The Citadel
6. The Royal Library Garden
7. Christianshavns Vold
8. Frederiksberg Gardens
9. The Deer Park
Some of Copenhagen’s parks are famous in Denmark and even abroad, whereas others are much less known and a lovely surprise in the city! Pick your favourites from the nine urban oases and historic parks in Copenhagen described below.
Of course, you can’t miss the magical and historic Tivoli Gardens when considering notable gardens in Copenhagen. Besides being an attractive amusement park with a historic roller coaster and many other iconic rides, Tivoli also features a beautiful garden with ponds and neat flowerbeds often arranged according to theme.
Late in the evening, you can enjoy the lights illuminating the entire park – before a gigantic firework display lights up the sky at midnight.
The historic amusement park was founded by Georg Carstensen in 1843 on a piece of land provided by King Christian VIII himself! In a short time, it became a favourite place in Copenhagen for musical entertainment and cultural events, including the traditional Pantomime Theatre with the famous characters Pierrot, Columbine, and Harlequin on stage.
Another almost equally famous garden is the King’s Garden. It dates from 1606 and belongs to Rosenborg Castle, the famous castle in Copenhagen built by King Christian IV – and today the home of the crown jewels in Denmark. Rosenborg Castle was constructed as a pleasure palace with a moat, a drawbridge, and a lovely Renaissance-style park, full of sculptures and symmetry. The garden was originally the castle’s vegetable garden and orchard, from where fresh produce came to the castle kitchen.
In 1721, the garden architect J. C. Krieger created a baroque garden in front of the castle with boxwood hedges.
In the Rose Garden, there is a statue of Queen Caroline Amalie (1796-1881), and statues by Aksel Hansen, Viggo Hørup, and Arthur Jacques Le Duc, can be found scattered throughout the park, the latter being a gift from the brewer Carl Jacobsen.
King Frederik III added 20 large stone balls to the garden architecture, of which only 16 remain today.
The Botanical Garden belongs to the University of Copenhagen and is a part of the Natural History Museum. The garden was first established in the 1600s, although at a different location. The lush garden contains a wide variety of vegetation from Denmark, a rhododendron garden, an arctic section, and a considerable collection of preserved plants in a herbarium.
Moreover, there is a tropical Palm House, which dates from 1874, and a Butterfly House with beautiful butterflies. In total, there are 13,000 plant species and 27 glass houses.
Not surprisingly, the Botanical Garden is a favourite place to hang out for the city’s students and other locals. There is a hilly terrain with a rock garden containing species from Central and Southern Europe and a lovely pond with water lilies and ducks. The pond is a remnant from when there was a moat around central Copenhagen. On the other side of Sølvgade, the green spaces continue into Østre Anlæg, which has a similar (even longer) lake formation.
Ørstedsparken belongs to the row of parks which were once part of the Copenhagen fortifications. It was designed by the landscape architect Henrik August Flindt and laid out as a public park in 1879. The elongated lake here is a remnant of the former moat, and the original bastions appear as tiny hilltops.
The park is named after Hans Christian Ørsted (born 1777), the Danish physicist who discovered electromagnetism, and his brother, the politician and former prime minister Anders Sandøe Ørsted (born 1778). There are monuments commemorating the brothers in Ørstedsparken and sculptures of other famous people such as Natalie Zahle, founder of Zahle’s School, and the sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen.
Copenhagen’s first public playground was established in Ørstedsparken.
Five bastions overlook the water-filled moat at the northernmost point of the former ramparts. They belong to the Citadel constructed under King Christian IV. Construction began in 1626 with the establishment of Sankt Anne’s Redoubt.
Inside the moat, you will find a military complex with dormitories, storehouses, the Commander’s house, an old granary, a former prison, and a church building.
There are two gates as access points, the King’s Gate and Norway Gate. In the Battle of Copenhagen (1807), the Citadel was used to defend the city against England.
The Citadel, easily recognisable by its characteristic red colour, is one of the best-preserved fortresses in Northern Europe.
A real gem has been tucked away behind larger buildings. A lovely public garden, the Royal Library Garden, exists on Slotsholmen between the parliament building Christiansborg Palace and the Royal Library. Designed in 1920 by the architects Jens Peder Andersen and Thorvald Jørgensen, the small park has a unique design and gives associations to the city’s maritime past with its centuries-old mooring ring.
It is a beautiful garden with blossoming trees and flowers surrounding a central pond with a remarkable copper column dedicated to the written word and a statue of the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, well matched with the contents of the old Royal Library.
A unique nature preserve belongs to the alternative autonomous community, the freetown Christiania, created in 1971 by a group of squatters, who took control of the former military barracks. The unconventional community of hippies and experimental ideologies still exists and is a popular site in Copenhagen to visit. The lush green spaces here, Christianshavns Vold, used to be part of the bastioned fortification ring surrounding Copenhagen.
Nevertheless, today, the green surroundings are a leisurely area for the residents, Copenhageners, and other visitors to Christiania. Two former gunpowder magazines are today popular venues for concerts and art displays in Christiania. You will soon discover that you are in a ‘different’ part of Copenhagen with quite unusual, primitive house constructions and interesting recycling architecture.
The original moat has been transformed into the wide canal, which runs between Christianshavn and central Amager. A footbridge connects the two sides. If you continue along the path in a northeasterly direction, you will also come across the Old Execution Site in Copenhagen (1946-1950).
Frederiksberg Gardens is a lovely park surrounded by a wealth of cultural offers – from fascinating museums and historic theatres (such as the Betty Nansen Theatre) to stylish traditional restaurants and a unique Walk of Fame of Danish actors at the prestigious Frederiksberg Allé. The lush garden is one of the most popular parks in Copenhagen.
In 1703, King Frederik IV finally saw his summer residence, the palace Frederiksberg Castle, completed. The palace park was laid out as an attractive baroque garden over the following decades. A Chinese Pavilion is one of the park highlights.
Frederiksberg Gardens was designed as a spectacular landscape garden with romantic canals, such that the Danish monarchs could sail through it, greeting people strolling around in the idyllic park. Today, there is a frequent boat service in summer, allowing visitors to experience the park from a different angle!
Another fine garden situated in a ‘corner’ of Frederiksberg Gardens is the garden of the Royal Horticultural Society (Haveselskabets Have).
Some kilometres north of Copenhagen, you will reach Dyrehaven, the Deer Park, an amazingly scenic area of woodlands, open spaces, and small lakes. Not surprisingly, the park is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This area of natural beauty is the playground of a multitude of deer, probably more than 2,000, and other fascinating animals that live in the centuries-old park. Royal hunting with hounds took place here for many years, and the Royal hunting lodge, the Hermitage, still stands in the middle of the park.
In many respects, it is a favourite park to visit north of Copenhagen, and people come here on excursions with picnics and entertainment for a day in nature. Others go jogging, explore on horseback or go for a bike ride through the landscape, looking out for the herds of grazing deer.
Finally, a visit to Bakken, the amusement park in a tiny corner of the huge Deer Park, is also a favourite place.
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9 Coolest Parks in Copenhagen
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