Christiansborg Slot

I really enjoyed going to Christiansborg Slot. I did the tour of the estate rooms and also took the tower elevator up to see the view from up there. The estate rooms were very pretty and ornate. The view from the tower was pretty impressive. There is free wi-​fi here and a nice gift store too. I recommend going for first time visitors.

(This review is specifically for the ruins underneath the palace — the main palace rooms were closed due to a royal function.)
Wow! As a history junkie, particularly for architecture, this was really amazing. The museum did a great job with signage (in English next to Danish), including short but intense descriptions of history, sketches of how the completed buildings would look, and discussions of the sequence of when certain things were built, demolished, and changed hands. There were clear arrows indicating how you should proceed through the exhibition rooms, so you were guaranteed to see everything.
The film on the evolution of the Christiansborg Palace was essentially a video version of the wall plaque in that room, so pending attention span, you could probably skip it (though it does show illustrations from artists at the time of each fire).
If you are asked to put your bags in the lockers, don’t leave your coat! It was very chilly down below — I had to put my gloves on!
Given that this is the only thing of its kind in the city and you are likely to see many other castles if you are staying a few days, I highly recommend going to the ruins and skipping the palace.

Christiansborg Palace is the latest of several palaces on the site — they had a couple of fires and rebuilds. The current palace is a good reconstruction, though, and fulfills a lot of duties — however you can’t access the areas of the Parliament or the Supreme Court. You do get to go to a few different areas. With the Copenhagen Card, all of these areas are included. However, without it I believe you have to pay separately for each area, which would get annoying.
The Queen’s Reception rooms are very opulent and fun to check out. You do have to store your backpacks and put on foot covers. Most people can just put them on over their shoes, but since I have giant feet, I had to walk around with them over my socks.
The ruins of the original castle from the 1100s are still there in an underground area. They have done excavations and you can now see the ruins underground. The lighting is dark but this was interesting to check out.
There is a palace chapel you can normally also check out, but it was closed when we visited.
If you don’t want to pay to get in, you can still walk around the courtyard, and go up the tower near the entrance, where there is a nice observation area that looks over the city on all sides. Definitely do this, if nothing else.

We had a free day in Copenhagen to do whatever since I didn’t plan one day on our itinerary. The plan was to not have any plans. Walk and get lost. No schedule, no specific destination.
On our walk, one of the first few things we saw by accident was Christiansborg Palace. It was beautiful and looked important so, we walked towards it early in the morning. We saw white horses and stables. We saw two men on horses — one of them looked important.
This place reminds me of France. Cobblestones, grand palace and copper statues. Not a bad place to get lost in.

Christianborg Palace was a fine stop for an afternoon with our Copenhagen Card, though I don’t end up feeling that it’s a must-​see site in Copenhagen. A lot of the internal sites were closed for renovation (crypts, e.g.), so we were able to see just one thing here – a self-​guided tour of the Versailles-​esque interior. And that’s exactly what it was, only much less Versailles-​esque than Versailles, of course. We walked around and saw some rooms and read some descriptive plaques. There wasn’t anything hugely special about it, I don’t think (aside from the fact that we all had to wear plastic booties over our shoes so as not to track in mud on the drizzly day).

There’s no shortage of castles and palaces in and around Copenhagen. Christiansborg palace starting in the 1100s has since been many buildings and also a combination of architectural styles. It’s also very utilitarian in that it holds all major branches of the government, executive, legislative and judicial. From the outside, the combination of styles makes it seem disjointed. I didnt go inside but apparently there is a huge preservation of the original castles ruins. Also, a theater and chapel exist there with the Thorvaldsen’s museum. I thunk next time im there ill overlook the external aesthetics and explore what exists inside the palace instead. 3.5 stars