For travelers, Time magazine last week released its lists of the 50 best places to visit and the 50 best places to stay in 2024.
In analyzing the list, we found that there are some amazing places and accommodations around the world, including many that would be very expensive to experience. Because many of the “best” places to visit are unknown to travelers and the selection is subjective, the list does not include an equal number of more amazing places and accommodations around the world.
Part of the 14,000-tone CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) detector is a spectacular sight at … in Switzerland. [+] The CERN particle physics research facility, named one of the most amazing places in the world by Time magazine. (Photo: Ronald Patrick/Getty Images)
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Europe features 12 places on Time magazine’s list of the 50 Best Places to Visit. Asia follows with 11 and the United States comes in third with eight. The Middle East and Africa feature five each.
When it comes to Time’s picks for Europe, you won’t expect classic tourist hotspots like the Alps or Danube cruises — other spots it rated “best” on the continent include Aviva Studios in Manchester, England, Bar Magritte in Brussels, Belgium, and the Riedhaus in Berlin, Germany.
Designed by a “leading architecture firm,” according to Time magazine, AVEVA Studios is a multi-purpose space capable of hosting small theater shows as well as large-scale multimedia performances and concerts.
Bar Magritte, a “cocktail wonderland” that TIME describes as a tribute to Belgian surrealist Rene Magritte, opened in November inside the Hotel Amigo, a luxury hotel built on the site of a former 16th-century prison.
Berlin’s Riedhaus is a new cultural institution that co-founder Klaus Sendlinger describes as a “modern temple” for sound-based performance and ritual, according to The New York Times. Built of concrete, glass, and reeds, the building was designed by Austrian architect Monica Goegl and features a 360-degree spatial audio system installed throughout the wooden ceiling.
Time magazine’s picks for the “best” places to visit in America will no doubt surprise most travelers: two are in Kansas City, Missouri, and the other two are in Buffalo, New York, and Alabama.
Time magazine has named the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens in Sarasota, Florida, one of the best botanical gardens in the world. [+] Location. (Photo by John Greim/LightRocket via Getty Images)
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Kansas City’s options are the new children’s museum “Rabbit Hole” and CPKC Stadium. Opened this spring in an old warehouse, visitors to the children’s museum enter “the hole,” a winding tunnel and cavern reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland.
The $120 million stadium “ushered in a new era for women’s sports, as it is the first stadium in the world built specifically for a women’s professional sports team,” Time magazine said. The stadium seats 11,500 and provides “world-class” facilities for the Kanasas City Current, a women’s professional soccer team.
The Buffalo AKG Museum of Art (formerly the Albright-Knox Art Museum) has been named one of Time magazine’s “Most Amazing” places, after a decade-long, $230 million renovation. “When visitors are finally able to visit the museum in June 2023, they’ll be greeted in the lobby by a remarkable canopy of mirror and glass, a collaboration between Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson and German architect Sebastian Behmann,” Time said.
Montgomery Whitewater Park in Alabama also made Time’s “Best” list. Designed by former Olympic kayaker Scott Shipley, it has “one of the most advanced man-made closed-loop whitewater channels in the world,” Time said. “One of only three of its kind in the U.S., the facility, opening in July 2023, is on a mission to make outdoor activities and healthy lifestyles accessible to everyone.”
To compile the 2024 list, Time magazine solicited nominations for hotels, cruise ships, restaurants, attractions, museums, parks and other locations “through an international network of correspondents and contributors and an application process, with a focus on places that offer new and exciting experiences.”
