Wrocław Market Square

What makes it special

The square covers about 3.8 hectares, and its middle is not open ground. A dense block of buildings fills the centre, the Old Town Hall among them. You walk round the outside of that block, past four frontages of tall tenement houses.

Walk all four frontages slowly. Sixty numbered plots ring the square, each house with its own painted facade and many with names such as Under the Griffins and Under the Blue Sun. The square was damaged in the Second World War, but most of its buildings survived and were carefully restored.

Eleven streets feed in, two at each corner, plus two narrow lanes and the small outer square of Kurzy Targ. Arriving from a different corner each time shows you a different frontage first.

A few smaller things are easy to miss. The stone pillory on the east side of the Town Hall stands as the symbol of the city court's authority, and the seated Aleksander Fredro monument came here from Lviv. At knee height on the Jaś tenement, between the square and St Elizabeth's Church, sits a small dwarf, one of the bronze figures you will meet all over the Old Town.

Visiting

Starting at the stone pillory on the east side of the Town Hall, cross to the western side and walk north. There you reach Jaś and Małgosia, two small houses joined by an arch.

Then cut through the central block rather than walking round it. Look for the passages signed Przejście Żelaźnicze and Przejście Garncarskie, which bring you out on the far frontage. Finish at the corner by Świdnicka Street, which gives the widest view back across the whole square.

The tourist information centre is on the square itself if you want a map. When an event fills the square, shorten your stops and look at the Town Hall from the edge rather than walking through the middle.

Guided or on your own

On your own works well here: the square is compact, and the loop above needs no guide. A guided walk adds the history behind the facades, and local companies run them through the square, the Town Hall and the streets around it. Electric melex carts also carry sightseers round the Old Town if you would rather ride.

Tips

Start a dwarf hunt at the Świdnicka Street entrance, where Papa Dwarf stands, placed in 2001 for the Orange Alternative, an anti-communist movement. You will not find them all in a weekend, so treat it as a game rather than a checklist. Photograph the bronzes without flash, which flattens their texture.

Some of the most interesting places hide in the side streets and small courtyards just off the square, and so are the better-value meals: restaurants on the Rynek itself charge more than places a few minutes away. In hot weather walk a shorter loop and carry water, and after rain watch your step on the wet stones.