Arras - a stunning French city with a lot of history and impressive architecture

Todays outing in France was to the stunning city of Arras. We had never been before and we absolutely loved it !

Arras city centre has some pretty impressive architecture, with the Bellfrey/Bell Tower of the Town hall claiming the grand prize ! It was pretty amazing.

The bell tower is located in this lovely city square called the place of Heros - after the allied soldiers who were stationed there during the first world war.

The square is otherwise lined with these stunning buildings on the other 3 sides. It certainly reminded me of architecture I've seen in countries like Belgium and Holland, which isnt overly surprising, noting this cities proximity to Belgium in the far North East of France.

When we got to the square, we just loved it, so we stopped and had lunch there, outside. It was fantastic to relax and take in the ambience - what a brilliant setting. Plus the bell tower was musical, and would ring out a tune every quarter an hour with its bells ! Quite impressive !

Just after lunch, we went on a short self-guided walking tour around the city centre. The first stop was the lovely Cathedral of Saint Jean-Baptiste.

Immediately next to the cathedral was this stunning little Chapel. I just loved that round window - what fantastic design !

The tour then lead us to the Grand Place (the Big Square), also lined with the same style of lovely buildings - although this time, with a lot of the middle of the square taken up as a car park - so it didnt have quite the same ambience as the Square of the Heros.

The tour then led us to this building at the end of the Square called the Hotel of the 3 Luppars (leopards or wolves maybe ???). This building was built 1467 and is the oldest house in Arras ! Quite stunning - and hard to believe its that old. If I had to guess, I would have put it at around 300 years old, not 550 !!!

And thats the other buildings in the same row - just stunning !

The tour then took us towards the other cathedral, and we spotted this cool shop sign on the way - well I liked it !!!

Close to the second cathedral, I spotted this other old church up a side street. Its called the Chapel of Carts. It was closed which was a pity.

Arras saw action during both world wars, and above is a close up of the stonework on the chapel - I wonder if thats damage from one of the wars - it certainly looks like it could be.

Then next up on the tour was the Cathedral of the Assumption of Our Lady and St Foster (Vedast) - thats a heck of a name !

The cathedral was huge, and we could not find an open door to get inside it which was a real shame - it looked pretty impressive from the outside.

We then passed the museum of beaux-arts. It was closed as well. There seemed to be quite a lot of things closed today, so clearly monday is not the day to visit Arras !

The tour then took us back to our starting place and the town hall.

I spotted this fine building just next to the town hall. It pays homage to the other old buildings in the city centre but with much more modern styling with a strong art deco influence. That to me is awesome architecture - I just loved it. Small, simple and beautiful !!!!

We were all totally impressed with Arras - what a fantastic city to explore.

The bell tower was amazing and stole the show for me. Although we also visited an underground site from the first world war - Wellington Quarry, which was quite amazing - but I'll cover it in another post.

Arras did not disappoint - what a fantastic city !