Top Historic Sights in Warsaw, Poland
Explore the historic highlights of Warsaw
St. John's Archcathedral
St. John's Archcathedral in Warsaw stands immediately adjacent to Warsaw's Jesuit church, and is one of the oldest churches in the city. St. John's Archcathedral is one of Poland's national pantheons. Along with the city, the church has been listed by UNESCO as of cultural significance. Originally built in the 14th century in Masovian Gothic style, the Cathedral served as a coronation and burial site for numerous Dukes o ...
Founded: 1390 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw Royal Castle
The history of the Royal Castle goes back to the 14th century when the Great Tower was erected. In the 16th and 17th centuries during the reign of Sigismund III Vasa, the Castle underwent large-scale expansion and was transformed into a five-winged edifice with an inner courtyard. It was a royal residence, the place where parliamentary deliberations were held and the administrative and cultural centre of the country. Des ...
Founded: 14th century |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Palace of Culture and Science
The Palace of Culture and Science is the tallest building in Poland and the eighth tallest building in the European Union. It is 231 metres tall, which includes a 43-metre high spire. The building was originally known as the Joseph Stalin Palace of Culture and Science, but in the wake of destalinization the dedication to Stalin was revoked. The building was conceived as a 'gift from the Soviet people to the Polish nation ...
Founded: 1952-1955 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw Uprising Museum
The Warsaw Uprising Museum is dedicated to the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. The institution of the Museum was established in 1983, but no construction work took place for many years, and the museum finally opened on July 31, 2004, marking the 60th anniversary of the Uprising. The Museum sponsors research into the history of the Uprising, and the history and possessions of the Polish Underground State. It collects and maintai ...
Founded: 1983 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Presidential Palace
The Presidential Palace is the elegant classicist latest version of a building that has stood on the Krakowskie Przedmieście site since 1643. Over the years, it has been rebuilt and remodeled many times. For its first 175 years, the palace was the private property of several aristocratic families. In 1791 it hosted the authors and advocates of the Constitution of May 3, 1791. It was in 1818 that the palace began its ...
Founded: 1643 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Holy Cross Church
The Church of the Holy Cross is one of the most notable Baroque churches in Poland"s capital. As early as the 15th century, a small wooden chapel of the Holy Cross had been erected here. In 1526 the chapel was demolished, and a newer church was erected. Refurbished and extended by Paweł Zembrzuski in 1615, the church was too small to fill the needs of the growing city. Initially located well outside the city lim ...
Founded: 1682 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Lazienki Palace
The origins of today’s Łazienki Palace date back to the late 17th century. The Bathhouse was built at the behest of Prince Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski, one of the most important politicians, writers and philosophers of the time. The Baroque garden pavilion, designed by the Dutch architect, Tylman van Gameren, was intended as a place for resting, leisure and contemplation. The interiors of the Bathhouse were styliz ...
Founded: 17th century |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Wilanów Palace
The history of the Wilanow Palace, a wonderful Baroque royal residence, began on April 23, 1677, when a village became the property of King John Sobieski III. Augustyn Locci, the king’s court architect, received the task of creating only a ground floor residence of a layout typical for the buildings of the Republic of Poland. However, military successes and an increase of the importance of royalty in the coming years ha ...
Founded: 1677-1696 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is dedicated to the unknown soldiers who have given their lives for Poland. It is one of many such national tombs of unknowns that were erected after World War I, and the most important such monument in Poland. The monument, located at Piłsudski Square, is the only surviving part of the Saxon Palace that occupied the spot until World War II. Since 2 November 1925 the tomb houses an un ...
Founded: 1925 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw National Museum
The National Museum in Warsaw was originally founded in 1862 as the Museum of Fine Arts and is currently one of the oldest art museums in the country. After Poland regained its independence in 1918, the National Museum was ascribed a prominent role in the plans for the new state and its capital city of Warsaw, and the Modernist building in which it currently resides was erected in 1927–1938. Today, the National Muse ...
Founded: 1862 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Church of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
The Church of the Visitation of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, otherwise known as St. Mary"s Church, is a church, is one of oldest buildings in Warsaw and one of the few surviving examples of Gothic architecture in the city. St. Mary"s Church stands on the site of an ancient pagan place of worship. The church"s foundation stone was laid by Janusz I the Old, Duke of Masovia and his wife, Danutė of Lithuania ...
Founded: 1409 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Belweder
Belweder Palace is today the residence of President of the Republic of Poland. The present building is the latest of several that stood on the site since 1660. Belweder once belonged to Poland"s last king, Stanisław August Poniatowski, who used it as a porcelain-manufacturing plant. From 1818 it was the residence of Russian Grand Duke Constantine, who fled it at the beginning of the November 1830 Uprising. Afte ...
Founded: 1660 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Ostrogski Palace
Ostrogski Palace site was bought by Prince Janusz Ostrogski in early 17th century. As the area had been still a suburb of Warsaw and exempted from the laws of the city which prevented the inhabitants from building private fortifications, Ostrogski decided to build a small castle there. For that he financed a bastion on which the manor was to be constructed. However, it was not until after his death that the manor itself w ...
Founded: 17th century |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Ujazdów Castle
Ujazdów Castle dates to the 13th century, and it was rebuilt several times. Like many structures in Warsaw, it sustained much damage in the Warsaw Uprising (1944). Reconstructed 30 years later (1974), it now houses Warsaw"s Center for Contemporary Art. The first castle on the spot was erected by the Dukes of Masovia as early as the 13th century. However, in the following century their court was moved to the f ...
Founded: 1624 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Fort Legionow
Fort Legionow was built between 1852 and 1854 on the southern foreland of the Warsaw Citadel. Initially, the fort had the shape of a three-storey artillery turret, surrounded by a fortified ditch with three cofferdams and a gallery in the counterscarp. Its task was to guard the citadel from the side of the New Town and also to defend the seasonal bridge over the Vistula River. In the years between 1866 and 1874 the fort ...
Founded: 1852 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
St. Florian's Cathedral
St. Florian"s Cathedral with its 75-meter towers dominates eastern Warsaw"s Praga district and highlight the cathedral’s role as a form of protest against the erstwhile Russian domination of Poland. There has been a Catholic church presence in or around the site of the future church since 1583, but the impetus for creating a lasting and substantial church did not arrive until the late 19th century. The ma ...
Founded: 1897 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw Citadel
Warsaw Citadel was built by personal order of Tsar Nicholas I after the 1830 November Uprising. Its chief architect, Major General Johan Jakob von Daehn (Ivan Dehn), used the plan of the citadel in Antwerp as the basis for his own plan (the same that was demolished by the French later that year). The fortress is a pentagon-shaped brick structure with high outer walls, enclosing an area of 36 hectares. Its construction re ...
Founded: 1834 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw Jewish Cemetery
The Warsaw Jewish Cemetery is one of the largest Jewish cemeteries in Europe and in the world. It was established in 1806 and occupies 33 hectares of land. The cemetery contains over 200,000 marked graves, as well as mass graves of victims of the Warsaw Ghetto. Many of these graves and crypts are overgrown, having been abandoned after the German invasion of Poland and subsequent Holocaust. Although the cemetery was closed ...
Founded: 1806 |
Location:
Warsaw, Poland