Tbilisi Opera and Ballet Theatre

The Zakaria Paliashvili Tbilisi Opera and Ballet State Theatre is the most eye-catching building on Rustaveli Avenue, with horseshoe arches, striped stonework and ornament inspired by Islamic architecture. Opera has been staged in Tbilisi since 1851, and the present house, designed by the architect Viktor Schröter, opened in 1896. It was rebuilt after a fire in 1973 and reopened in 2016 after a long renovation, its gilded auditorium once again among the finest in the Caucasus. The theatre carries the name of the composer Zakaria Paliashvili, whose opera Abesalom da Eteri remains a fixture of the repertoire, and he is buried beside the building.

The house is home to the national opera company and the State Ballet of Georgia, directed by the former Bolshoi star Nina Ananiashvili. A night at the ballet or opera here is one of the most memorable evenings Tbilisi offers, and smart casual clothes are fine. Tickets sell online and at the box office on the avenue. If you cannot catch a show, the facade alone deserves a look on any walk along Rustaveli, especially when it is lit up after dark.

Tbilisi's first opera house opened in 1851 in a theatre on Erivan Square, today's Freedom Square, and burned down in 1874. The new building on what was then Golovin Avenue, designed by Viktor Schröter in a pseudo-Moorish style, opened in 1896. The theatre was later named after Zakaria Paliashvili, the founder of Georgian classical opera. A fire in 1973 gutted much of the interior, which was rebuilt, and a full renovation from 2010 restored the building before its reopening in January 2016.