Presidential Palace

This guide to the Presidential Palace in Helsinki centers on its most famous night, Linnan juhlat, the Independence Day ball held every December 6th, tracing it from a dry 1919 gathering of about one hundred fifty guests to the crowd of roughly eighteen hundred it draws today. It moves through the palace's earlier life as a timber merchant's private house and the years it stayed alcohol-free under prohibition, along with the karjalanpiirakka and Lemi lamb still served each year. Listen for the punch recipe the kitchen has never published.