Montreal, Canada

The Palais des Congrés de Montreal, with its multicolored facade, is the site of many meetings and conventions.

"Je me souviens" (I remember) is Quebec’s provincial motto, and history is present everywhere in Montreal, a city teeming with architecture and culture from the past three centuries. Canada’s second largest, third oldest, and most cosmopolitan city is also a hub for technological innovation and avant-garde art—there’s an ultramodern, global sensibility here that coexists with a sense of the past. Similarly, French and English, once considered the “two solitudes,” have intermingled to make a culture of easy bilingualism that is now a fait accompli for most Montrealers. Montreal is, at once, consummately European and also grounded in New World enthusiasm. It’s also known as the “city of festivals,” with year-round celebrations of food, film, music, and culture. “We’re a bread and circuses kind of town, and we contain multitudes,” says Bill Brownstein, city columnist, the Gazette, the city’s only English daily.