Helsinki

A Baltic capital of design, islands and granite churches. Helsinki spreads across a granite peninsula and some 300 islands on the Gulf of Finland, a city of neoclassical squares, design studios and ferries. Senate Square and the white Helsinki Cathedral form its symbolic centre; the Temppeliaukio Church is cut directly into a rock outcrop, and the Uspenski Cathedral of 1868 is the largest Orthodox church in western Europe. Suomenlinna, the sea fortress on eight islands offshore, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site reached by a 15-minute ferry.