The Zizkov Television Tower

The Zizkov television tower is 216 metres of steel and concrete standing on three legs in a residential district east of the centre, and Prague has argued about it since it went up between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s. Crawling up the columns are ten oversized bronze babies with barcode faces, added later by the artist David Cerny, which turned a widely disliked structure into a landmark people photograph on purpose. A lift takes you to observation pods at around ninety metres, well above everything else in the city, giving a full circle over the roofs of Zizkov and Vinohrady, the castle ridge, the river bends and the hills beyond.

What you actually see

• The babies - ten large bronze infants with blank barcode faces climbing the outside of the columns.
• The observation pods - glazed capsules at about ninety metres, with a complete circle of the city.
• The castle view - the ridge of Prague Castle and Petrin seen across the whole width of the old city.
• The tower structure - the three columns and capsules, an unmistakable piece of late twentieth century engineering.

When to go

Late afternoon into dusk is the best slot, when you get the city in daylight and then lit up, and it stays open into the evening. Clear winter days give the longest views. Book online for sunset in summer, when slots sell out. Midday sun causes hard reflections on the pod glass and poor photographs.

Honest expectations

The ticket is expensive for a lift ride, and the pods are small, so a full one feels cramped. The glass is thick and reflective and fights photographers. Zizkov is a twenty minute trip from the old town, which surprises people. Opinions on the design remain divided, and the babies are hard to see properly from directly below.

Nearby

Zizkov's pubs and the Vinohrady streets are on the doorstep, and Vitkov hill has a free view of its own.