If you'd like to see Danish architecture that is usually closed to Copenhagen visitors, visit Copenhagen for the: Copenhagen Architecture & Design Days each May.

Architecture in Copenhagen: The last few years have witnessed an increasing interest in Danish design from the 20th century. This renaissance is founded on the work of several great names, including Arne Jacobsen, Hans J. Wegner, Kaare Klint and Poul Henningsen.

Their designs are very much back in style, having been featured extensively by trend-setting magazines like Wallpaper, Dazed and Confused, and Vogue. Jacobsen's Egg, Ant and Swan chairs, and Henningsen's lamp shades for example, are still to be seen in many of the coolest cafés and retro-style bars in Copenhagen (Pussy Galore's Flying Circus and Stero Bar are prime examples), as well as in London and New York.

Arne Jacobsen is often thought of as the godfather of Danish design and, in 2002, Copenhagen celebrated the 100th anniversary of his birth. Jacobsen, who died in 1971, was one of the pioneers of functionalism and his buildings helped define not only an architectural movement but an era of design. One of his greatest works is the 1960 Radisson SAS Royal Hotel across from Tivoli. Here Jacobsen's famous attention to detail encompassed every aspect of the building, right down to the door handles. The Radisson SAS Royal Hotel was Copenhagen's first skyscraper, and as a tribute to its designer, room 606 remains to this day a shrine to its designer, featuring the original furniture and fittings he created for it.

On the top floor of the hotel is a stunning restaurant, Alberto K, named after the first director of the hotel and, again, featuring Jacobsen's original interior furnishings and fittings, right down to his space-age cutlery, which was used in the film "2001 -A Space Odyssey".

Arne Jacobsen is not the only internationally renowned Danish architect who retains a presence in Copenhagen. Jørn Utzon, designer of probably the world's most famous building, the Sydney Opera House, also designed the Paustian furniture store in the dock area (also see Shopping in Copenhagen).

In growing numbers international architects are placing their mark on the city. American Daniel Liebeskind has designed Dansk Jødisk Museum (The Jewish Museum) in 2004. Norman Foster has designed the new elephant house and enclosure in the Copenhagen Zoo (open in 2008), Frenchman Jean Nouvel has designed the concert hall of the National Broadcasting Company (planned opening spring 2008) and finally Iraqi born Zaha Hadid has designed the stunning new wing of the art museum just north of Copenhagen, called Ordupgaard, which opened in 2005.

Copenhagen has a host of architectural gems, many of which are open to the public. As well as the aforementioned Jacobsen-designed Radisson SAS Hotel and National Bank, and Utzon's Paustian furniture store, architecture lovers in Denmark will enjoy two of the capital's finest art museums, both of which boast radical, new extensions.

The Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek's French wing, designed by one of the world's most respected architects, the Dane Henning Larsen, is a masterpiece of light and space, while the monumental glass and concrete extension to the National Gallery (designed by Anna Maria Indrio), which now houses its modern art collection, is worth the entrance fee alone.

The jewel in Copenhagen's architectural crown has to be the new extension to the 19th century redbrick Royal Library. The new building (designed by Schmidt, Hammer & Lassen) leans dramatically over the waterfront, its granite and glass walls reflecting water and light in a constant flux of colour and movement. Nicknamed "the Black Diamond", the extension along with the library, houses a concert hall, bookshop, café, exhibition space and the superb restaurant, Søren K.