Church of Our Saviour's is one of Denmark's most famous churches. Ever since the serpentine spire was inaugurated in 1752, is has been a popular passtime to climb the 400 steps to the top.

This large baroque church in the Christianshavn district of Copenhagen is one of Denmark's major tourist attractions. With its twisted spire, the church is a national treasure, but also a living parish church for about 8000 people.

Buildings from the baroque period are rather rare in Denmark. When, in 1660, following long and bloody wars, Denmark lost the southern part of what is now Sweden, King Frederik III introduced an hereditary absolute monarchy and it was his son, Christian V, the first to be born as an absolute monarch, who was to cement absolutism through an impressive building style. Our Saviour's Church (Vor Frelsers Kirke) was his greatest work and his monogram is to be seen in many parts of the church. Since he also made the Order of the Elephant into the most prominent of the Danish orders, the elephant decoration is also to be found in the church, both in the stucco work and on the organ plinth.

The church was built in the 1680s and consecrated on 19th April 1696. It took 14 years to build and since the whole area consists of filled-in sea bed, the construction of the church foundations took a long time.

The Palladian-Netherlandic style used by the court builder, Lambert van Haven, is a solemn, baroque, order. Red brick on a sound granite foundation with sandstone cornices below the roof - a real Templum Salvatoris (Saviour's Temple) where everything has its correct placing. The ground plan is a Greek equal-sided cross with corner chapels. Not a part of van Haven's plans, the artful tower was added 50 years later, and can distract from the seriousness and ambition that was part of the architecture of the building itself.

By Danish standards, the dimensions of the church are enormous. The height to the ceiling rafters is 36 metres. The walls and four pillars are based on boulders buried in ditches that go down to Copenhagen's limestone bed.