Things to do in Antwerp

Landmark · Centre

A 1905 railway cathedral of marble, gilt and glass, rebuilt internally into four levels of platforms without touching the shell.

Local tip: Go down to level -2 and look back up. The 2007 reconstruction dug the station out beneath the original hall so through-trains could run north, and the vertical view through all four levels is the best thing about it. The diamond district begins directly outside the side entrance.

Neighborhood · South of the centre

Wide nineteenth-century boulevards built on the old citadel, now the city's museum and restaurant quarter.

Local tip: The KMSKA reopened in 2022 after eleven years of works with a startling white intervention inside the old building; go for the Ensors. The streets around Marnixplaats have the best terrace density in the city and locals eat far later here than Belgian stereotypes suggest.

Culture · Immediately east of Centraal station

Four streets of trading offices, bourses and security doors that have handled the world's rough diamonds for a century.

Local tip: There is nothing to see from the street and that is the point — the trade happens behind unmarked doors. What is visible is the extraordinary social mix: Orthodox Jewish and Indian Jain families have run this business side by side for decades, and the surrounding kosher and vegetarian restaurants are excellent and entirely unbothered by visitors.

Neighborhood · Old docklands, north of the centre

Nineteenth-century docks converted into flats, with a red sandstone museum tower at the centre of it.

Local tip: The MAS escalators up to the tenth-floor roof terrace are free and open late — the best panorama of the port, the Scheldt and the city, at no cost. Go at dusk when the terminal lights come on to the north.

Neighborhood · East, beside Berchem station

A single extraordinary district of 1900s art nouveau, neoclassical and neo-Renaissance townhouses built in competitive excess.

Local tip: Cogels-Osylei was nearly demolished for flats in the 1960s and saved by residents. Walk it and then sit in Dageraadplaats, which is where the neighbourhood actually lives — a square of cafés with almost no visitors, five minutes from a street architects travel to see.

Landmark · Under the Scheldt, from Sint-Jansvliet

A 572-metre pedestrian tunnel from 1933 running beneath the river to the left bank, with its original wooden escalators still in service.

Local tip: The wooden-tread escalators are among the last working examples in Europe and the descent is worth the trip on its own. Come out on Linkeroever for the classic postcard view of the Antwerp skyline across the water — which you cannot get from the city side — and walk back through, or take the bike lane.