Antwerp in Belgium is one of Europe’s most underrated city break destinations. Great beer, eye-opening port cruises, fashion shopping and stand-out historical museums combine. Here’s how to make the best of two days there.
Planning your Antwerp trip
When to visit Antwerp
Belgium’s style capital is more pleasant to mooch around in the summer months, and the Antwerp Summer Festival, with scores of concerts, exhibitions and theatrical performances, runs between June and August. December brings the Christmas Markets, but for the rest of the year, much depends on whether you’re planning to be flitting between museums and pubs, or walking outside and taking boat trips.
Antwerp hotel recommendations
Next to Antwerp’s glorious Centraal Station – a golden age slice of grandeur worth exploring in its own right – the Park Inn is perky, and gets all the basics right. There’s also free access to the pool at the neighbouring, pricier Radisson.
The Hotel Julien has lashings of design flair – the ceiling paintings feel like they belong in a church, and there are Serge Gainsbourg prints on the walls. The basement spa, hammam and solarium are bonuses.
Five great things to do in Antwerp
- 🍺 Taste fantastic local beers – on an Antwerp brewing heritage tour.
- 🌙 Enjoy an evening walking tour – and discover Antwerp’s dark side.
- 🚢 See the ships industry and sights in Europe’s second-biggest port – on a harbour cruise.
- 🚲 Take a bike tour – and cover more of Antwerp’s highlights.
- 📖 Learn Antwerp’s best stories and legends – on a walking tour.
Getting to and around Antwerp
The simplest route to Antwerp from the UK is on a Eurostar train from London St Pancras. They stop at Brussels, but connections to Antwerp are included in the price.
The architecturally glorious Antwerp Centraal Station is to the east of the historic centre, and borders on the Diamond District, where the surprisingly drab jewellers and traders fuel the world diamond industry.
The city is very pedestrian-friendly, but tram journeys may be needed for longer schleps. Single tickets cost €3.
DAY ONE
An art nouveau walk in Zurenborg
South-east of the city centre, residential neighbourhood Zurenborg is a delight to amble around due to the concentration of top-drawer art nouveau architecture. If nature motifs, sumptuous curves and wrought iron balconies are your thing, then Waterloostraat is the epicentre. Dageraadplatz, largely tourist-free, has a host of café terraces to have lazy coffee and breakfast on.
Go shopping in Sint Andries
Antwerp has been a fashion capital since the late 80s when a loose collective known as the Antwerp Six burst onto the international scene. Sint Andries, the neighbourhood south of the city centre, is home to dozens of local designers, many of which cluster on Kammenstraat. Dries van Noten’s Modepaleis shows off one of the original Antwerp Six’s brazenly bold, turned up to eleven, floral pattern couture.
The best attraction in Antwerp
The Red Star Line Museum aims to tell the story of the transatlantic shipping company once based in Antwerp, but it is so much more than that. It is a tale of migration, bravery and a desire to start another life on the other side of the world.
Over two million people passed through Antwerp on the way to the US in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and individual stories of success, danger and heartbreak are told in a thoroughly absorbing manner.
Some gambled everything they had for a new life, and many had no idea what to expect when they hit North America.
A lovably shambolic beer bar
To go to Belgium without thoroughly indulging in the world’s best beer is a borderline criminal offence, and Kulminator at Vleminckveld 32 has a hundreds-strong menu of options to choose from. It’s a lovably shambolic place, covered in clutter and old bottles, but the disorganised garden shed vibe adds to the charm.
A seafood dinner
Het Zuid, south of Sint Andries, is the in-the-know evening hang out, with plenty of buzzy restaurants to choose from. Fiskebar, inside an old fishmonger’s shop, has an unapologetically seafood-centric menu, and serves up sensational fresh-caught platters.
DAY TWO
A walk around central Antwerp
Start off at the Museum Plantin-Moretus, a World Heritage site in its own right. It’s the former home and office of a printing dynasty, and it’s the rooms full of typesetting blocks and centuries-old printing presses downstairs that stick in the memory. Which says a lot, given the tapestry walls and Rubens portraits upstairs.
Afterwards, take an amble through the cobbled street cuteness of the historic centre. The centrepiece is mildly dog-eared Grote Markt, where the enjoyably gory Brabo Fountain features a hero surrounded by sea monsters and decapitated heads.
Stained glass and art in the cathedral
Take a pew in Antwerp’s glamorously Gothic cathedral, which is anything but austere inside. Lavish side chapels and stained glass windows come alongside an impressive art collection, which includes works by old masters Rubens and Van Dyck.
Take a port cruise
Antwerp plays host to Europe’s second largest port, and while a cruise around it is deeply unsexy, going past the enormous banana warehouses, gargantuan chemical plants, hulking oil refineries and skyscraping cranes at the loading docks is weirdly compelling. The sheer scale of it is an eye-opener. Flandria’s three hour cruise takes in all the industrial majesty, and throws in some chocolate sampling to sweeten the deal. Tickets cost €22.
More Antwerp travel
Other Antwerp travel articles on Planet Whitley include:
