The Zappeion is the great neoclassical exhibition hall sitting in its own grounds at the southern end of the National Garden — a circular Corinthian rotunda fronted by a colonnaded portico, completed in 1888 by the architects Theophil Hansen and Ernst Ziller. It was built for the revival of the Olympic Games and hosted the first modern Olympic fencing tournament in 1896.
Today it functions mainly as a conference centre and event venue and is rarely open to casual visitors. The gardens around the building, with their Roman fragments and shaded benches, are pleasant in their own right and serve as the southern extension of the National Garden. Floodlit at night.