Since May 2011, Nova Gorica has been joined with Gorizia and Šempeter-Vrtojba in a common trans-border metropolitan zone, administered by a joint administration board.
Nova Gorica hosts one of the three national theatres in Slovenia. Goriška Museum is also located in the town’s Kromberk district, hosted in Kromberk Castle. The University of Nova Gorica is located in the suburb of Rožna Dolina. The Nova Gorica Grammar School, located in the city centre, is one of the most renowned high schools in Slovenia. The cultural magazine Razpotja is published in Nova Gorica. Nova Gorica and Gorizia won their joint bid to be designated as European Capital of Culture in 2025; the other city selected for that year is Chemnitz, Germany.
To the south of the town stands Kostanjevica Hill, home to the Church of the Annunciation of Our Lady and a 17th-century Franciscanmonastery with rich treasures from the past. The last members of the Bourbons, the French royal family, are buried in a crypt beneath the church (Charles X himself, and members of his family and entourage including his son Louis-Antoine de France, and his grandson Henri d’Artois, nephew of Louis (neither Louis-Antoine nor Henri ever reigned as kings)). He fled France following the revolution in 1830, finding refuge in Gorizia, and eventually died there. Also buried there is Pierre Louis Jean Casimir de Blacas, a Bourbon nobleman who also died in exile (in 1839).
Opposite Kostanjevica Hill, north of the town is the settlement of Sveta Gora with Holy Mount (Slovene: Sveta gora) a 682-meter (2,238 ft) peak that has attracted pilgrims for 450 years. The view from there is exceptional, and on a clear day visitors can see as far as Istria, Venice, the Dolomites, and the Kamnik and Julian Alps. The mountain top is home to a magnificent basilica, where concerts are occasionally held, a Franciscan monastery, and a museum of the Battles of the Isonzo.
