Southern Railway Headquarters

The city's main post office in the Esplanade area, an Indo-Saracenic building completed in 1884 to a design by Robert Chisholm. Its arcaded corridors, domes and decorative stonework make it one of the finest heritage government buildings in Chennai. It has functioned continuously as a postal hub for well over a century.

A Shakti temple on Thambu Chetty Street where the presiding deity is the goddess Kalikambal (Kamakshi) with her consort Kamateswarar. Tradition holds that the Maratha emperor Shivaji worshipped here in 1677, and it is famously the temple where actor Rajinikanth prays. Originally sited near the seashore, it was relocated inland by the British in 1670.

A warren of stalls near the harbour set up in the 1960s by Tamil repatriates from Burma, long famous for smuggled and imported electronics, foreign goods and pirated media. It also hosts eateries serving Burmese atho and other dishes brought back by the settlers. It remains a colourful, chaotic George Town institution.

The Armenian Church of the Holy Virgin Mary in George Town, whose present structure dates to 1712, is a serene memorial to Chennai's once-thriving Armenian merchant community. It is celebrated for its belfry of six bells and the many Armenian graves in its tranquil courtyard, and stands near where Haroutiun Shmavonian published Azdarar, the world's first Armenian-language journal.

Completed in 1892, this sprawling red-sandstone complex is one of the grandest examples of Indo-Saracenic architecture in the world and long ranked as the second-largest judicial building after the Courts of London. Its domes, minarets and stained-glass-lit corridors dominate the northern seafront. A lighthouse once operated from atop one of its towers.

Dedicated to Lord Murugan and popularly called Kandha Kottam, this is one of the most important Murugan temples in old Madras. Also known as the Muthukumaraswamy Devasthanam, it was established in the 17th century by the Vellala merchant community of George Town. Its annual Skanda Sashti festival draws large crowds.

The historic North-Indian and Marwari trading quarter of George Town, a dense grid of wholesale cloth, jewellery and hardware markets and the temple cluster around Mint Street. It is celebrated for its Rajasthani and Gujarati vegetarian street food along Mint and Godown streets. The name derives from 'sowcar', meaning moneylender or banker.

A Shiva temple on Mint Street built in the 1680s by Alanganatha Pillai, a dubash of the East India Company, and modelled on the great Ekambareswarar temple of Kanchipuram. It has an ornate gopuram and a temple tank, and is flanked by Jain shrines and the Kandaswamy temple. It anchors the dense temple cluster of old George Town.

A Shiva temple built alongside the Chennakesava Perumal Temple by Manali Muthukrishna Mudaliar in 1762, the two are known together as the 'Twin Temples' or Pattinam Temples of Chennai and share an interlinking passage. It replaced an earlier shrine razed by the East India Company. The paired Vishnu-Shiva complex is one of the oldest surviving temple foundations of colonial Madras.

This Vishnu temple honours Chenna Kesava Perumal, regarded as the patron deity of Chennai, and the city's name 'Chennapattanam' is widely believed to derive from it. The original was built by Beri Thimappa, the dubash who brokered the 1639 land deal that created Madras. After the East India Company demolished the first structure in 1757, the present temple was rebuilt in 1762 by Manali Muthukrishna Mudaliar.

Built by the English East India Company and completed around 1644, Fort St. George was the first English fortress in India and the nucleus around which the city of Madras (Chennai) grew. It still functions as a working seat of government, housing the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly and Secretariat, alongside the Fort Museum and St. Mary's Church.

A cenotaph at the northern end of the Marina, near Fort St. George, erected to commemorate soldiers of the Madras Presidency who died in the First World War. It later also honoured the dead of the Second World War and independent India's conflicts. Wreath-laying ceremonies are held here on national days.