Casa da Música

Casa da Música is the building that announced a new Porto. Designed by the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas and his practice OMA, and opened in the mid-2000s after Porto's year as a European Capital of Culture, it sits on the Rotunda da Boavista like a giant faceted white stone that has landed on a sloping travertine plaza. Inside, it is a labyrinth of staircases, escalators and unexpected spaces wrapped around two main auditoriums, and it is home to the city's resident orchestras and a year-round programme of classical, jazz, world, pop and electronic music. The main hall, the Sala Suggia, is a shoebox-shaped auditorium with walls of plywood patterned with gold leaf in an enlarged wood-grain design, and its two ends are made of corrugated glass, so the audience sees the city beyond the stage; a smaller hall follows the same idea. Elsewhere, the architects played with Portuguese tradition: one salon is covered floor to ceiling in blue-and-white azulejos, another uses geometric tiles, and a rooftop terrace looks out over Boavista. The guided tour, about an hour long and led by a guide, is the only way to see the building outside a concert, and it is excellent; public tours run daily in several languages, including English, subject to the concert programme, and which spaces you see depends on rehearsals and events that day. Tickets are inexpensive, under-twelves go free with an adult, and combined tickets with Serralves or a port lodge are sometimes offered.

The building divides opinion, which is part of its appeal. Critics have called it one of the most significant concert halls of its generation, admired for its acoustics and its radical inversion of the traditional concert hall, in which the auditorium is open to the city. Others find its exterior cold. Either way, it changed the image of Porto, showing that the city of Baroque churches and port lodges could also commission cutting-edge design, and together with Serralves it anchors the modern cultural axis of the western city.

How to visit: check the guided tour schedule on the official site, as times can change with the concert calendar; English tours are booked separately through the site. Arrive a few minutes early at the ticket office. The tour climbs and descends a great deal, through staircases and narrow passages, so wear comfortable shoes; parts of the building are accessible by lift, so mention mobility needs in advance. Photography is usually allowed. Afterward, the café and restaurant in the building are pleasant places to linger, and the plaza outside is a favourite spot for skateboarders.

Better still, hear it: a concert here is the finest way to experience the building, and the programme is broad enough that most visitors can find something to enjoy on any given week, often at reasonable prices. Evening concerts let you see the glass walls of the hall light up against the city. The Rotunda da Boavista, a large roundabout park with a monument to the Peninsular War, has a metro station, and the building is a short metro ride from the Avenida dos Aliados, making it an easy evening outing from a central hotel.