Kadriorg Palace and Park

Peter the Great took Tallinn in 1710 and started building Kadriorg eight years later, naming it for Catherine. The palace is a compact pink-and-white baroque block by the Italian architect Niccolò Michetti, and the main hall inside is the best surviving baroque interior in Estonia.

What you actually see

A symmetrical two-storey facade above a formal flower garden with a fountain, and behind it the Great Hall - a double-height room in white stucco with heavy ceiling relief, restored to something close to its original state. The palace now holds the foreign art collection of the Art Museum of Estonia, so the rooms are hung with Dutch, German and Russian paintings.

The park around it is large and informal: oak and chestnut avenues, the swan pond with its wooden pavilion, the Japanese garden, and the presidential residence behind its fence at the top of the slope. KUMU, the modern art museum, sits at the far edge.

When to go

• May to June - the formal garden is planted and the park is at its freshest.
• September to October - the oaks and chestnuts turn; this is the best-looking month.
• Winter - the palace interiors carry the visit, and the pond freezes over.

Honest expectations

The palace is small. From outside it reads as a large manor rather than a royal residence, and the tour is over quickly - the collection and the Great Hall are the substance, not the scale.

The park is genuinely public and busy at weekends, with joggers, prams and dogs. It is not a preserved historic garden experience.

Nearby

KUMU is a five-minute walk. The Song Festival Grounds and Pirita are further along the same coast road, and the old town is fifteen minutes back by tram.