315 Best Sights in Belgium

The Town Hall is an early example of what excessive taxes can do for a city. In 1516, Antwerp's Domien de Waghemakere and Mechelen's Rombout Keldermans, two prominent architects, were called in to build a town hall that would put all others to shame. However, before the building could be completed, Emperor Charles V imposed new taxes that drained the city's resources. The architecture thus reflects the changing fortunes of the city: the side built in 1518–60 and facing Hoogpoort is in flamboyant Gothic style; when work resumed in 1580, during the short-lived Protestant Republic, the Botermarkt side was completed in a stricter and more economical Renaissance style. 

Overlooking the Grotemarkt stands the Stadhuis (town hall) and belfry. It was built originally as a cloth hall in the 14th century. However, like the rest of the town, it was destroyed in World War I, the belfry having collapsed onto the market square below. Only the outer walls and a few paintings survived. It was restored in the 1920s, when a new 49-bell carillon was bought for the belfry, which has recently also opened to visitors. 

Explore the history of Ghent through nine rooms, all documenting significant moments in the formation of the city. Each room addresses a different era, from the time human beings first settled in the area some 70,000 years ago, to the city's medieval-era clashes with the Dukes of Burgundy, right up to its modern industrial heritage. The tour winds its way through a 14th-century abbey, a 17th-century monastery, and the modern museum, and there is also a giant map room that allows you to see how the city has expanded over the years.

Another museum that delves into Belgium's comic-book past, though it does so via the figurines and toys they inspired, displayed in various dioramas. Mostly, it's a selfie-paradise for those who long to have a picture of themselves with a giant Smurf or a cutout of Captain Haddock. And that's no bad thing.  

Before VR, this was the closest you got to an immersive experience. This huge circular painting of the battle was created by the artist Louis Dumoulin in 1912 and is 360 feet long, wrapping the circular gallery in which it's displayed. Sound effects (yelling, cannon fire) set the scene. 

Baudouin IV, Count of Hainaut, began construction of this Norman-style keep in 1166. Sandwiched between the two arms of the Dender, it was the perfect position to defend against his ambitious neighboring lord, the Count of Flanders. These days it overlooks a few utility buildings and an adjacent schoolyard—a less menacing threat! Inside are treasures of the age and a video on its history in the guard room, but interior visits are restricted to guided tours, which can be arranged via the tourism office (currently in Espace Gallo-Romain). 

A fascinating relic from the only time that England, driven by the ambitions of young Tudor king Henry VIII, invaded what is now Belgium. He captured two French cities before moving on to Tournai, which was seized in the Battle of Guinegate. Just a year later, Henry's advisor, Thomas Wolsey, would sue for peace, and England kept Tournai. This tower was built to house Henry's troops in 1515 and was part of a larger citadel. Under Henry's rule, the town maintained a representative in the English parliament, but locals never took to their new owners and it proved costly to maintain a town so far from Calais. In 1519, Tournai was sold back to the French for 600,000 gold crowns (a huge amount).

In 1835, Belgium established the first steam passenger railway on mainland Europe—it connected Brussels and Mechelen—and it was one of the first to establish a national railway network. Train World pays full homage to this illustrious railway history. Located in the hangars of Belgium's oldest functioning station, Schaerbeek, it contains 20 full-size locomotives, many of which you can clamber aboard and explore.

Three kilometers (2 miles) north from the Memorial Museum Passchendaele 1917, the British cemetery Tyne Cot is---with almost 12,000 graves---the largest and best known of more than 170 military cemeteries in the area. In its awe-inspiring austerity, it evokes the agony of anonymous and unknown losses. A significant majority of the graves here are for unidentified casualties, and a curving wall lists the names of nearly 35,000 Commonwealth soldiers killed after August 1917 whose bodies and graves vanished in the turmoil of war. A large cross stands atop one of the German pillbox bunkers for which the site was named; British troops trying to gain the ridge dubbed it a cot, or cottage.

This quiet cobblestone lane in the center of Antwerp seems untouched by time. The mood and style of the 16th century are perfectly preserved here. There is no better time to linger than on a Monday night when the carillon concert is pealing from the cathedral. The alley ends in Pelgrimsstraat, where there is a great view of the cathedral spire.

The Gothic butcher's guild is Antwerp's oldest remaining public building and was once the only place in the city where meat could be sold. Over the centuries it has morphed from a guild hall into a refined music museum, focusing on 600 years of the musical life of the city.

The city museum is set within the old butcher's hall, built in the mid-15th century. Over the years, this building has filled just about every function a city requires: cloth hall, aldermen's house, prison, guild hall, theater, guardroom. The current museum was installed in the early 1900s and begins its exhibits in prehistory, working its way up to the end of the ancien régime and France's collapse into revolution in the late 1700s. It's an enjoyable grab bag of history, with a 28,000-year-old mammoth skeleton among its most engaging exhibits.  

A row of 17th-century whitewashed almshouses originally built for retired shoemakers now holds an engaging Folklore Museum. Within each house is a reconstructed historic interior: a grocery shop, a living room, a tavern, a cobbler’s workshop, a classroom, a pharmacy, and a kitchen. Another wing holds a tailor’s shop and a collection of old advertising posters. You can end your tour at the suitably historic museum café, In de Zwarte Kat (the “Black Cat”).

This 14th-century tower was renamed for Louis Zimmer, who designed its astronomical clock with 11 faces in 1930. His studio, where 57 dials show the movements of the moon, the tides, the zodiac, and other cosmic phenomena, is inside the tower.

Southeast of the city center, past Centraal Station, lies the most beautiful neighborhood in Antwerp: Zurenborg. It was one of few parts of the modern city that was actually planned—and not simply a result of industrial necessity—when it was transformed in the early 20th century with street after street of Belle Époque, neoclassical, and Art Nouveau town houses. The highlight is Cogels-Osylei, a street famed for its elaborate Art Nouveau "flower" houses, all named after different flora. Its urban palaces once housed the city's bourgeoisie, while the larger Dageraadplaats was designed for the middle classes but remains no less ambitious and has long since been adopted by Antwerp's "bobo" set, with plenty of hip bars and cafés nearby. Historical walking tours are a good way to explore the area and are easily booked at the tourist information.