Odense: the city of Hans Christian Andersen

Birthplace of the author of 'The Little Mermaid' and 'The Ugly Duckling', Odense has built much of its tourist identity around the memory of Hans Christian Andersen.

The centre, where Hans Christian Andersen was born, is easily explored on foot between the timber-framed houses of his childhood neighbourhood.

The Hans Christian Andersen Museum, expanded in 2021 with a semi-underground building surrounded by a labyrinthine garden, recounts the life and works of the author born here in 1805.

Nearby, the district of half-timbered houses where Andersen grew up preserves the atmosphere of an early nineteenth-century Danish provincial town, with cobbled alleys and hidden gardens.

Continuing, you reach the Cathedral of Saint Canute, a brick Gothic structure that houses the relics of King Canute IV of Denmark.

As evening approaches, the public gardens along the Odense River offer a peaceful walk before dinner, among the resident ducks and swans.

Andersen left Odense very young to pursue an acting career in Copenhagen, finding fame only years later as a writer of fairy tales that would captivate readers of every age worldwide.

The new museum, designed not to exceed the height of surrounding historic buildings, develops mainly underground, with rooms themed after the most celebrated individual fairy tales.