Time Releases List Of The World’s ‘Greatest Places’

For travelers, Time last week released its 2024 lists of the 50 Greatest Places to Visit and the 50 Greatest Places to Stay.

My analysis of the lists reveals spectacular places and lodgings throughout the world, including many that would be very expensive to experience. Many of the “greatest” places to visit are unknown to vacationers, and — because the choices are subjective — the lists omit an equal number or more of spectacular places and lodgings worldwide.

Twelve places in Europe are on Time’s 50 Greatest Places to Visit list. Asia follows with 11 places on the list, and the USA ranks third with eight places. The Middle East and Africa each have five places.

Don’t expect age-old tourist attractions such as the Alps or a Danube cruise in Time’s European picks. Its “greatest” picks on the continent include Aviva Studios in Manchester, England; Bar Magritte in Brussels, Belgium, and Reethaus in Berlin, Germany.

Aviva Studios, which, Time says, was designed by a “powerhouse architectural firm,” is a multi-use space that can host intimate theater shows and large multimedia performances and concerts.

Bar Magritte is “a cocktail wonderland” — a bar honoring surrealist Belgian arist René Magritte, Time says. The watering hole opened in November inside Hotel Amigo, a luxury hotel on the site of a 16th-Century prison.

Berlin’s Reethaus is a new cultural venue that co-founder Claus Sendlinger, according to the New York Times, described as a “modern temple” for sound-based performances and rituals. The structure, built with concrete, glass and reeds, was designed by Austrian architect Monika Gogl and has a 360-degree spatial sound system installed throughout its wooden ceiling.

Time’s “greatest” places to visit in the USA would undoubtedly surprise most travelers. Two places are in Kansas City, Missouri, and two other places are in Buffalo, New York, and Alabama.

The Kansas City choices are a new children’s museum, The Rabbit hOle, and CPKC Stadium. Visitors to the children’s museum, which opened this spring in an old warehouse, go into a “hole”of winding tunnels and caves reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland.

The $120 million stadium “kicked off a new era in women’s sports — the world’s first stadium purpose-built for a women’s professional sports team,” Time says. The stadium has 11,500 seats and provides “world-class” facilities for the women’s pro soccer team, the Kanasas City Current.

The Buffalo AKG Art Museum, formerly the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, is another of Time’s “greatest” places. It took 10 years and $230 million to renovate. “When museumgoers were finally able to return in June 2023,” Time says, “they were greeted in the lobby by a jaw-dropping canopy formed from mirrors and glass — a collaboration between Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson and German architect Sebastian Behmann.”

Montgomery Whitewater park in Alabama also is on Time’s “greatest” list. It was designed by former Olympian kayaker Scott Shipley and has “one of the world’s most advanced man-made, recirculating whitewater channels,” Time says. “One of just three venues of its kind in the U.S., the facility opened in July 2023 with a mission to make outdoor activities and healthy lifestyles accessible to everyone.”

To compile the 2024 lists, Time solicited nominations of places — including hotels, cruises, restaurants, attractions, museums and parks — “from its international network of correspondents and contributors, as well as through an application process, with an eye toward those offering new and exciting experiences.”