I smell a lovely fanfic idea for this.

“Here is Canterlot, known in antiquity as Unicornia. In the center of the Principality of Equestria, it is the beating heart of a nation that stretches from one shore to another beneath a shepherded Sun and Moon, a beacon of harmony, regal power and prosperity that has stood for nearly three thousand years. All roads lead to Canterlot, and it is here, all journeys would begin and end.”

We need a good “capital city game theme” for this.  
Royal Capital _{Majestic Grandeur}

She’s so dirtyyyyyyyyyy  
She’s extremely dirtyyyyyyyy  
She needs more than sooooooooap

Huh. I could have sworn I’d already favorited this. Well.

I always thought Canterlot resembled (fantasy) Baghdad out of the “Arabian Nights” stories.

How my soul pines to return.

This is magnificent and well deserving of the feature.

Man, I do love the look of Canterlot’s magnificent spires and towers.  
For passers by, it must be more than a feast to the eye, truly a jewel of a city.

Wow, this one’s beautiful. How have I missed it until now?

@Lucky Shot
 
“All of the show’s settings have this problem. Like a child’s imagination, the relative scale and location of places within each town mutate randomly, as though the world has no concrete organization and adjusts based on the traveler’s perception and intention.”
 
It might just be me, but I feel like that sort of response is exactly the feeling they were going for.  
It is a kids’ show after all; it makes sense that they would design it with that sort of aesthetic.

Sometimes I think I’d like to do a scene picture like this, but Canterlot’s towers drive me crazy because they have no real volume or meaning. There’s no rhyme or reason to any of the locations of either the spires or their windows, and the function and history of such ancient and central towers should be clear from looking at them but isn’t (other than the tallest spire, which glows like God himself and is presumably where Celestia is standing, but has no other distinction from anywhere else in town.)
 
I can’t tell anything about the city or its layout and districts from its exterior alone – it’s essentially nothing but these carbon-cobied ivory towers, elven bridges, and rarely level windows everywhere – and this would cause me to discard my picture because it was impossible to actually illustrate a glorified and proudly cultured capital city, there being absolutely no support in the grossly insufficient source material to work with.
 
All of the show’s settings have this problem. Like a child’s imagination, the relative scale and location of places within each town mutate randomly, as though the world has no concrete organization and adjusts based on the traveler’s perception and intention.
 
Of course, none of this is the artist’s fault. He or she is just faithfully following Canterlot’s aesthetic, which is a mix of Wonderland-esque oversimplification and MC Escher’s less surreal drawings such as Relativity. With how much time was taken with the texture detailing and directional lighting I can’t really ask for him/her to basically create a wholly original, detailed & fleshed-out city where there really wasn’t one.
 
I’m not really critiquing the image since the artist hasn’t done anything wrong. It just reminds me of my frustrations with FiM’s bland lore and my general reluctance to attempt scene pieces.

Wow… how many hours must have gone into making this?

Must be a lonely existence…  
The only pony in a world full of silhouettes…

shit, how am i going to get this cart up those stairs

Wash your damn hooves!

“Here is Canterlot, known in antiquity as Unicornia. In the center of the Principality of Equestria, it is the beating heart of a nation that stretches from one shore to another beneath a shepherded Sun and Moon, a beacon of harmony, regal power and prosperity that had stood for nearly five thousand years. All roads lead to Canterlot, and it is here, all journeys would begin and end.”

Stairs. A cart’s natural enemy.

@Blackie  
I’m having a difficult time visualizing a city as an entire country.
 
The architecture looks like the Hollywood version of medieval Europe, anyway - so I guess Byzantine would be close, as @SeraphimDawn said.

@Blackie  
Looks more Byzantine than Greek. Then again the Byzantine people mostly spoke Greek as their primary language.

Absolutely fantastic!

@PonyPon  
You mean it isn’t?

This is what canterlot is supposed to look like. Immense, splendid and ancient.

I’m getting a mediaeval castle. Earth ponies and other hoi polloi enter by the back door.

I’m struck by the feeling if you had no idea what Canterlot looked like and you somehow ended up there, your first thought might be: “What is this? Disney World?”