Editorials

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Georgetown Is the Only Capital in South America Built Mostly of Wood

Guyana's capital sits below sea level behind a Dutch-built sea wall, and its historic centre, including one of the tallest wooden churches ever built, is constructed largely from timber rather than stone.

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Sofia Puts a Roman Ruin, a Mosque and a Synagogue Within Sight of Each Other, and Barely Mentions It

Bulgaria's capital has spent millennia as Serdica, then an Ottoman provincial seat, then a Soviet-aligned capital, and it wears all three pasts at once in a compact centre that most European city breaks still skip.

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Pristina Has No Old Town to Sell, Which Is Exactly What Makes It Interesting

Kosovo's capital skipped the old-town restoration playbook that shaped its Balkan neighbours, leaving a young, café-driven city that reads more like a work in progress than a finished attraction.

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Brunei's Capital Holds the World's Largest Residential Palace, and Still Bans Public Bars

Oil and gas wealth built Bandar Seri Begawan's gold-domed mosque and the Sultan's mile-long palace, but the city runs on strict Islamic law, a public alcohol ban and a tourism industry that barely registers by Southeast Asian standards.

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Ashgabat Built an Entire Capital in White Marble, Then Kept the Streets Nearly Empty

Turkmenistan's capital holds the record for the world's densest cluster of white marble buildings, a monumental, tightly controlled city that remains one of Asia's least-visited despite (or because of) its scale.

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Ulaanbaatar Hasn't Decided Whether It's a Ger District or a Glass Skyline, and That's the Point

Mongolia's capital has moved sites and renamed itself repeatedly since its founding as a mobile Buddhist monastery in 1639, and today its Soviet-planned centre sits between glass towers and the ger districts that still house much of the city.

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Skopje Doesn't Care That Its New Monuments Don't Match Its Old Bazaar, and That's Exactly the Point

North Macedonia's capital spent roughly a decade building an ambitious, much-debated cluster of neoclassical monuments beside one of the Balkans' oldest working bazaars, and the clash between the two is becoming the city's real draw.

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Dushanbe Rebuilt Itself as a Soviet Showcase City, Then Kept Building After the Soviets Left

Tajikistan's capital grew from a Monday market town into a planned Soviet capital and then, after independence, into a city of oversized monuments and marble ministries. The contrast is the whole point of visiting.

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Tashkent Rebuilt Itself After a 1966 Earthquake, and Its Metro Stations Are the Best Argument for the Result

Levelled by a 1966 earthquake and rebuilt as a Soviet showpiece, Tashkent is easy to skip in favour of Samarkand and Bukhara, but its metro stations alone justify a stop.

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Kigali Is Africa's Cleanest Capital, and It's Turning That Into a Selling Point

Rwanda's hilly, meticulously kept capital has spent two decades building a reputation for order and safety, and is now leaning on that same reputation to pull in conference delegates and gorilla-trekking travellers alike.

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Bishkek Is a Soviet Grid City That Never Bothered to Look Like a Capital

Kyrgyzstan's capital, laid out under Soviet planning with wide tree-lined avenues and irrigation channels running along its pavements, makes little effort to perform as a capital city, which is precisely what makes it worth a stop before the Tian Shan.

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Vientiane Is the Mekong Capital That Never Started Trying to Impress You

Vientiane remains one of Southeast Asia's smallest and least developed capitals, its Mekong-side streets and golden stupa offering a slower, more unpolished alternative to Bangkok or Hanoi.