YerevanTravel Guide

The oldest surviving quarter of Yerevan, on a low hill just west of the centre, and the one piece of the old town that the twentieth-century replanning never flattened.

Yerevan's covered GUM market is only technically about shopping.

Yerevan was largely replanned from the 1920s by the architect Alexander Tamanian, who imposed a radial layout and a palette of local volcanic tuff in pink, apricot and grey.

East of the centre, the old garden district, where nineteenth and early twentieth-century houses stand behind walls among fruit trees.

At the top of Mashtots Avenue, the Matenadaran holds one of the world's great collections of medieval manuscripts — thousands of illuminated Armenian texts, some rescued page by page from war and exile.

The national bread, and UNESCO-recognised as a cultural tradition.

Armenia's answer to the flatbread pizza: a thin crisp round spread with spiced minced meat, squeezed with lemon, rolled and eaten with your hands.

A flatbread packed with a dense filling of finely chopped wild greens and herbs, originally from Artsakh and now sold across Yerevan.

Armenian barbecue, and the centre of gravity of any gathering: pork, lamb or chicken skewered and grilled over vine cuttings, plus whole aubergines, peppers and tomatoes charred and peeled into a smoky salad.