Phoenix's Most Iconic Landmarks

The Desert Botanical Garden opened in 1939 in Papago Park, the result of efforts by a group of local plant lovers who wanted to protect and study the plants of the world's deserts.

Over the decades it has grown into one of the leading botanical gardens devoted to arid lands, with collections of cacti, agaves, succulents and desert trees from the Sonoran Desert and arid regions around the world.

Trails loop through themed areas that explain how plants and people survive in the desert.

The Desert Discovery Loop leads past towering saguaros, rare cacti and blooming wildflowers, while other trails explore the plants used for food and medicine by the region's Indigenous peoples and Sonoran Desert habitats.

Butterfly and wildflower exhibits appear in season, and the red sandstone buttes of Papago Park form a dramatic backdrop.

The garden is also a cultural venue. Its winter Las Noches de las Luminarias, when paths are lit by thousands of luminarias, is one of the Valley's favorite holiday traditions, and seasonal art installations, concerts and evening events draw visitors throughout the year.

Taliesin West was begun in 1937 by the architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who came to Arizona to escape the Wisconsin winters and built a winter home, studio and school in the foothills of the McDowell Mountains.

Wright and his apprentices constructed the buildings by hand, using local rocks set in concrete, redwood beams and canvas roofs that filtered the bright desert light.

The complex reflects Wright's idea of organic architecture, in which buildings grow out of their landscape.

Low, angular structures echo the shapes of the surrounding mountains, terraces open to long views across the valley, and the materials and colors seem to come straight from the desert floor. Wright continued to experiment and rebuild here until his death in 1959.

Today Taliesin West is the headquarters of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation and part of a UNESCO World Heritage listing of eight major works by Wright.

Guided and self-guided tours take visitors through the drafting studio, the cabaret theater, the music pavilion and Wright's living quarters.

The Musical Instrument Museum, known as MIM, opened in 2010 in north Phoenix and quickly became one of the city's most popular attractions. It was founded by Robert J.

Ulrich, a former chief executive of Target, with the goal of showing how music connects cultures around the world.

The museum's geographic galleries display thousands of instruments from nearly every country, many shown alongside videos of musicians playing them in their home communities.

Wireless headphones automatically play the music as you approach each display, turning a walk through the galleries into a journey around the world's sounds. Other galleries focus on instruments played by famous artists and on how instruments are made and restored.

In the Experience Gallery, visitors of all ages can play instruments from around the world, from drums and gongs to harps. The museum also has a concert theater that hosts performances by artists from many genres and countries.

Papago Park is a desert park of rounded red sandstone buttes on the border between Phoenix and Tempe. Its formations were shaped by millions of years of erosion, and its most famous feature is Hole-in-the-Rock, a butte with a large natural opening that looks out over the city.

A short trail leads up to the opening, where visitors sit to watch the sunset.

Archaeologists believe the Hohokam people may have used Hole-in-the-Rock to track the movements of the sun, since light passing through a small hole in the ceiling falls on different spots during the year.

Today the park's trails attract walkers, runners and cyclists, and its fishing lagoons and picnic areas make it a favorite family destination.

Papago Park is also home to the Desert Botanical Garden and the Phoenix Zoo, as well as a small white pyramid marking the tomb of George W. P. Hunt, Arizona's first governor. On a hilltop nearby, the tomb offers views across the valley.

Heritage Square preserves a group of historic homes from the late 19th and early 20th centuries on one block of downtown Phoenix, a reminder of the small town that existed before the city's explosive growth.

Its centerpiece is the Rosson House, an Eastlake Victorian mansion completed in 1895 for Dr. Roland Lee Rosson and his family, with brick walls, a wraparound veranda and a distinctive tower.

The Rosson House has been carefully restored and furnished with period pieces, and guided tours show how a prosperous family lived in territorial Phoenix, before air conditioning, when thick walls and high ceilings were essential.

Other buildings on the square house restaurants and small businesses, including one of the city's most famous pizzerias.

The square sits next to the Arizona Science Center and the Phoenix Convention Center, and it offers a pleasant, shaded break in the heart of downtown. It is a rare place where you can still see what early Phoenix looked like.

Tovrea Castle was built around 1930 by Alessio Carraro, an Italian immigrant who hoped to create a resort hotel at the center of a planned housing development on the eastern edge of Phoenix.

The building's tiered, castle-like shape, often compared to a wedding cake, made it instantly recognizable, but the development plans never materialized.

The property was later bought by the Tovrea family, who ran a large stockyard and meatpacking business nearby, and the family lived in the castle for decades.

Eventually the City of Phoenix acquired the castle and its grounds and restored them, including the extensive cactus garden that surrounds the building.

Today Tovrea Castle is open to the public only through guided tours, which explain its history and the story of the families who lived there. The castle and its garden, glowing white above the desert landscape, have become one of Phoenix's most unusual landmarks.