This is one of the proofs that Rijeka is where Central Europe meets the Mediterranean. The National Theatre in Rijeka was largely the work of Fellner and Helmer, a Viennese architectural studio specialising in theatre design, responsible for, among others, the Prague State Opera and the colonnade and Grand Hotel Pupp in the Czech spa Karlovy Vary. When the theatre opened in 1885, it was lit by the first electric lightbulb in Rijeka. In the newly-landscaped park in front of the theatre stands a memorial to Rijeka’s composer Ivan Zajc, one of the most important contributors to the development of classical music in Croatia.