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Groningen is the capital of its own province and the largest city in the northern Netherlands, which means it has the confident, slightly independent character of a regional center that has never had to defer to Amsterdam. The University of Groningen, founded in 1614 -- the same year Harvard was founded in Massachusetts -- gives the city its underlying energy: roughly a quarter of the population is students at any given time, and the effect on the restaurant, bar, and cultural scene is substantial. The Martinikerk, the towering Gothic church at the Grote Markt, has been the visual anchor of the city since the 14th century, and the adjacent Martinitoren can be climbed for views over the flat province and, on clear days, across to the Wadden Sea islands.

The Forum Groningen, opened in 2019, is a remarkable building on the Nieuwe Markt: a wave-shaped structure designed by NL Architects with a public roof terrace and a mix of cinema, library, and museum spaces that has become the city's most popular gathering point.

The Groninger Museum across the canal from the central station, designed by Alessandro Mendini with contributions from Coop Himmelblau and Philippe Starck, is one of the most architecturally audacious museum buildings in the Netherlands, its primary-color sections jutting over the water in a way that still divides opinion 30 years after it opened.