The last weekend of February, Tamar and I (without our kids!) spent a few days in Copenhagen, the beautiful capital of Denmark, and we loved discovering this wonderful city.

There's just so much to appreciate -- the beautiful architecture, slightly austere and with deep, beautiful colours. The very kind and handsome people. The amount of bikes! The food culture (no surprise that the best restaurant in the world is located right here). The sea, right there. And, of course, the design, apparent in each and every detail of society.

Here are a few of our favourite discoveries. I definitely recommend visiting Copenhagen -- we definitely want to go back soon with our kids!

Hay House is the flagship store of the Danish design company Hay, and is filled to the brim with beautiful and inspiring design. Funnily enough it's located on the 2nd and 3rd floor of an apartment building with a rather unpretentious entrance, but still, everyone knows where to find this beautiful store.

Royal Smushi is a brunch and lunch restaurant with a wonderful, eclectic interior which can only make you happy. They serve delicious 'smushi' -- beautiful pieces of food art, a mix between the local 'smørrebrød' (an open-faced sandwich) and sushi.

Copenhagen is filled with the most amazing coffee places. Forloren Espresso became our favourite daily coffee retreat -- the super nice owner looks a little bit like a scientist and his coffee is simply amazing!

Stilleben was recommended to us by one of the shop ladies from Hay House, and it's truly a little gem of a shop. Every single piece of merchandise is so incredibly beautiful!

Atelier September is an initiative of two ex-cooks of Michelin restaurant kitchens. They cook simple and fresh, mostly raw and organic dishes with a strong local influence. The atmosphere here is so fresh and airy, the food is delicious and the space is just beautiful!

Illum Bolighus is a department store right in the centre of the city and it is filled to the brim with design, design, and more design. If only we had a bigger purse! : ) So wonderful to watch all of this beauty, and make a giant mental wish-list...

Copenhagen is such a bike-friendly city and it was such a pleasure for us Dutchies to be able to cycle around and discover the parts of Copenhagen that are located a bit further away from the city centre. We cycled along the shore, waved to our friends in Sweden, and had a tasteful, typical Danish brunch at Wullf Og Konstali.

The Danish Design Museum is located in Copenhagen and of course we had to visit. It's just incredible to learn about the history of design of this design-led country and the enormous amounts of design classics that originate from here.

We stepped into Lêlê Street Kitchen, a Central Vietnamese street style restaurant for a quick and super yummy lunch. I wish the Lêlê cookbooks would come in English, they looked incredibly inspiring!

Traveling without our children, we could take full advantage of the great nightlife Copenhangen has to offer -- cocktail bars, wine bars, and great restaurants. We spent a lot of time in Vesterbro, one of the hippest neighbourhoods of the world, apparently. (We felt hopeless out of place!) In the former meat market are a few amazing restaurants -- we tried the seafood restaurant Kødbyens Fiskebar and had a wonderful (my favourite!) dinner at Paté Paté. We drank delicious wines at Malbeck. We tried Mad Men style cocktails at Ruby's and Lidkoeb, a super cool cocktail house in an 18th century apothecary located in a difficult-to-find courtyard behind the main street, so mysterious! I promised Tamar that next time I would have a whiskey with him on the top floor, where a sparsely lit bar with vintage leather couches and a private club feel, serves over 200 whiskeys from all over the world... and only whiskey-drinking people are allowed inside!

I can't wait to go back and visit Copenhagen with our children. I want to visit Tivoli with them, and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. I've heard the Torvehallern (the food markets) are nice to visit and I'm sure my kid would love that. We didn't have time to try 42 Raw this time, and Noma was unfortunately closed, but both are on my wish-list of places to eat.

If you know of more places that are worthwile to visit in Copenhagen and surroundings, or have other tips for fun things to do, please do share in the comments. I'm thinking that next time, maybe we can drive from Amsterdam and visit Legoland on the way. And then maybe we'll cross the bridge to Sweden and see Malmö too...

xxx Esther