Explore Corfu

The Liston is an arcaded row of buildings on the west side of the Spianada, the central square of Corfu, built from 1807 under French rule and modelled on the Rue de Rivoli in Paris; cafés fill its arcades. The Spianada is part garden, part open lawn used as a cricket ground, with the Maitland Rotunda and a bandstand.

The Palace of St. Michael and St. George is a neoclassical palace at the north end of the Spianada in Corfu, built in 1819–1824 to designs by George Whitmore as the residence of the British Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands. Its state rooms and the Museum of Asian Art, whose collection began in 1927, are open to visitors.

The New Fortress stands on the hill of St Mark above the old port of Corfu, built by the Venetians from the late 16th century, after the Ottoman siege of 1537, to protect the town outside the old citadel. The British added the barracks inside; the top is a naval station, and the bastions look over the town and the sea.

The Old Fortress of Corfu covers the rocky promontory east of the old town, cut off from it by the Contrafossa, a sea moat dug by the Venetians. Its walls withstood the Ottoman sieges of 1537, 1571 and 1716. Paths lead up to the twin peaks, which gave Corfu its Western name, with views over the town and the sea.

Mon Repos is a neoclassical villa in the wooded Palaiopolis estate about 2 km south of Corfu town, built in 1828–1831 for the British High Commissioner Frederick Adam and later a summer residence of the Greek royal family; Prince Philip was born there in 1921. Since 2001 it has housed the Museum of Palaiopolis.

The Achilleion is a palace at Gastouri, about 10 km south of Corfu town, built around 1890 for Empress Elisabeth of Austria to designs by Raffaele Caritto and named after the hero Achilles; Kaiser Wilhelm II bought it in 1907. Ernst Herter's statue Dying Achilles stands in the terraced gardens, which look out over the island and the sea.