Flame Towers

The exteriors are clad in LED screens — more than ten thousand high-power fixtures across the three faces — running a synchronised display after dark.

The best-known sequence is an animation of flames rising up all three towers, which is genuinely striking on first sight. The programme also cycles through the Azerbaijani flag and a figure waving, and it changes for national occasions.

The display typically runs from dusk until late evening. Timings shift seasonally, so if the light show is the reason you are going, ask us to confirm for your dates.

The towers are private buildings — offices, apartments and a hotel — so the experience is the view of them rather than from them. Choosing your vantage point matters more than usual.

Highland Park, directly across, is the standard viewpoint and the stop on our city tour. It gives you the towers, the bay and the Old City rooftops in a single frame.

Baku Boulevard offers a lower angle with the towers rising behind the seafront. The Maiden Tower roof gives a third perspective looking up from inside the walls. Each is a distinctly different photograph.

The towers were designed by HOK and completed in 2012, at a cost widely reported in the region of $350 million. Each has a different function: one hotel, one residential, one office.

Opinions on them are not unanimous. They are unquestionably effective as a symbol and as a piece of city branding; whether they sit well against the medieval walls below is a matter people in Baku argue about. That tension is arguably part of what makes the view from Highland Park interesting.