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Madrid’s southern railway station is also a palm garden and an arresting architectural monument. The old terminal, a magnificent cast-iron structure, 152 m (500 ft) long and more than 40 m (130 ft) high, overlooks Plaza de Atocha. It was designed by Alberto del Palacio in 1888 – the French engineer Gustave Eiffel, designer of Paris’s famous tower, was a consultant – and completed four years later. When, more than a century later, the decision was taken to run a new high-speed train service to Seville (AVE), prize-winning Spanish architect Rafael Moneo was commissioned to remodel the terminal. His makeover incorporated the square and the old station canopy, and added a cylindrical lantern over the commuter station, and a streamlined glass concourse from where the AVE now departs.

Housed in a 19th-century mansion overlooking the Retiro is this compelling collection of furniture, silverware, ceramics and glassware from the royal factory of La Granja, as well as jewellery, tapestries, clocks, toys and musical instruments. But the museum is more than a showcase of handicrafts. Arranged chronologically over four floors are reconstructed rooms illustrating Spanish domestic life from the 16th to the early 20th centuries. Unmissable on the fourth floor is the recreated Valencian kitchen, decorated with more than 1,600 hand-painted azulejo tiles. The below-stairs life of an 18th-century palace is vividly brought to life as servants struggle with trays of pies and sweetmeats while the domestic cats filch fish and eels.

This much-loved city park is a constant source of pleasure to madrileños , especially at weekends and during the hot summer months. There are open spaces to enjoy, as well as wooded areas and formal gardens (see Parque del Retiro).

One of Madrid’s busiest traffic intersections also boasts the city’s most famous landmark. The Fountain of Cybele, designed by Ventura Rodríguez, depicts the goddess of nature and abundance riding her chariot, hauled by a pair of prancing lions. (The water-spouting cherubs were added at the end of the 19th century.) The most striking architectural monument on the square is the wonderfully over-the-top Palacio de Comunicaciones (see Palacio de Comunicaciones). Opposite is the Neo-Baroque Palacio de Linares, one of the city’s finest 19th-century buildings, and now the Casa de América (see Casa de América). On the corner of Calle Recoletos, partly hidden from view by its steeply sloping gardens, is the former Palacio de Buenavista, commissioned in 1777 for the Duchess of Alba, a legendary beauty and one-time lover of artist Francisco de Goya. Today it is home to the General Army Barracks.

This leafy square honours the fallen heroes of the 1808 uprising against the French (see Insurrection). The ashes of the rebel leaders, immortalized in Goya’s famous painting (see Museo del Prado), were interred in the funerary urns beneath the obelisk when the project was finally completed in 1840. The beautifully proportioned Neo-Classical building occupying the north side of the square is the Madrid Stock Exchange, designed by Enrique María Repullés in 1884. Visitors may admire the Corinthian-columned façade at any time, but anyone wishing to see the trading floor from the gallery (parquet flooring, painted vaults, stained-glass ceiling and gilded clock) will have to join the guided tour at midday.

Anyone seeking a bit of peace and quiet will relish these delightful gardens, inaugurated in 1781 as a centre for botanical research. The three ascending terraces conform to Juan de Villanueva’s original design. Beyond the main entrance is the herbarium, the aromatic, culinary and medicinal plants neatly arranged in separate beds and individually labelled. The rose garden adds a dash of colour. The central terrace arranges plants by family, species and genealogical history. Look out for the 100-year-old tree known as “El Pantalones” because of its resemblance to a pair of inverted trousers – disease has split the trunk in half. More than 1,200 tropical and sub-tropical species are cultivated in the Exhibition Greenhouse, opened in 1993. The Villanueva Pavilion and the arbors, by contrast, date back to the 18th century. The statue by the pond honours the great Swedish botanist, Carl von Linné (Linnaeus), who devised the system of plant classification.