Just outside Qianmen, Dashilan is one of Beijing’s oldest commercial streets, with a history of over 600 years. It used to be the busiest suburban market and remains full of character today. Some of Beijing’s oldest brand boutiques started here, alongside the city’s first cinema, and many are still operating. Walking the street gives a sense of everyday life beyond the imperial palaces, where locals have shopped, worked, and socialised for generations.

With its romantic grounds, Sofiero Palace makes for a popular destination. The grounds are perhaps best known for their unparalleled rhododendrons, with an incredible 5,000 bushes bursting into flower in the spring. The fairytale of Sofiero began in 1864, when Crown Prince Oskar and his wife Sophia had their summer residence built here. In 1905, Oskar — by now King Oskar ll — gave the palace to his grandson Prince Gustav Adolf and his bride Princess Margareta as a wedding present. This is when the gardens literally flourished. Princess Margareta was a keen and creative gardener, and it was she who first laid out the grounds that we can enjoy to this day. She arranged flower beds and gardens, had paving laid and wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. Every summer, the Crown Prince couple travelled from Stockholm with their four young princes and Princess Ingrid, who eventually became Queen of Denmark. When Margareta died in 1920, Gustaf Adolf carried on the work in the garden, particularly with the rhododendrons. The palace was the summer residence of the Swedish royal family up until 1973, when it was given to the town of Helsingborg. This small palace, which lies like a jewel amid the extensive lawns, is home to a restaurant where the food is prepared by some of Sweden’s finest chefs. There’s also a café with views of the Öresund Sound and Denmark.

Once considered the most magnificent of China’s imperial gardens, Yuanmingyuan was filled with palaces, lakes, and pavilions, as well as rare plants and artworks collected from across the empire. It was destroyed in 1860 by British and French troops during the Second Opium War, and again suffered damage in 1900 during the Boxer Rebellion. What remains today are ruins — stone foundations, broken archways, and scattered carvings — set among lakes and quiet parkland.