Dating back to the 19th century, Parc des Buttes Chaumont in Paris has transformed remarkably from old quarries. Rowan Moore from The Guardian points out in his list of the world’s best urban green spots that the park’s appeal shines through its beautiful landscapes, striking cliffs, and the iconic Temple de la Sibylle perched on a rocky outcrop.

A vertiginous work of ravines, rocks, follies and bridges, 25 hectares of toy savage landscape formed out of old quarries by the engineer Adolphe Alphand under the direction of Baron Haussmann, the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont is the alter ego of the straight-lined order of the Baron’s famous boulevards. It inspired the surrealist writer Louis Aragon, for whom it was “ludicrous and alluring,” “a test tube of human chemistry” and a “crazy area born in the head of an architect from the conflict between Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the economic conditions of existence in Paris.” It is all these things and more.