Discover 7 hidden attractions, cool sights, and unusual things to do in Arlon (Belgium). Don't miss out on these must-see attractions: Musée Gaspar, Archaeological Museum, and Cimetière d'Arlon. Also, be sure to include St. Martin's Church in your itinerary.
Below, you can find the list of the most amazing places you should visit in Arlon (Wallonie).
Table of Contents
Musée Gaspar
The Gaspar Museum is a museum located in the heart of the Belgian city of Arlon dedicated to the art and history of Arlon and its region.
Located on the edge of a wooded park, this 19th century bourgeois residence was bequeathed to the city of Arlon by Charles Gaspar (1871-1950), a pictorialist photographer, collector, patron and benefactor of the city. Although his will stipulates that the entire house and all the collections go to the city, it includes a condition: to make his house a museum.
From then on, at his death in 1950, Charles bequeathed an immense collection of photographs, paintings, engravings, sculptures, furniture and old books to his native city. In addition, there are the works (bronzes and plaster casts) of Jean Gaspar (1861-1931), his sculptor brother. This prestigious collection is now the Gaspar legacy, the core of the museum's permanent collection.
In addition to this, there are other art collections, gleaned over the years, including the Fisenne altarpiece, a jewel of religious art from the Antwerp workshops of the 16th century and the centerpiece of the collection.
The whole is nestled in a house entirely restored in 2003, and dedicated, since its opening in 2004, to the art and history of Arlon and its region.
The museum lives mainly to the rhythm of temporary exhibitions where the art and history of the Greater Region are presented to the public in a playful way. As a privileged partner of the Academy of Fine Arts of the City of Arlon, the museum proposes every June an ephemeral art exhibition in the Gaspar Park. This is an opportunity for the students of the academy to present the fruit of their artistic research to the walkers and visitors of this urban park.
The museum, one of the actors of the Art & Mus Network (MSW), is an "admitted children's museum" and offers various activities to young visitors: young visitor's guide, birthday party at the museum, family workshops...
Address: Rue des Martyrs 16, 6700 Arlon
Archaeological Museum
The Arlon Archaeological Museum is a Belgian museum located in Arlon in the Walloon Region that brings together an important collection of archaeological remains unearthed on the territory of the province of Luxembourg. It is renowned for its Gallo-Roman section, in particular the collection of funerary sculptures, which is one of the most important in Europe.
Created in 1886, it has been housed since 1934 in a neoclassical building built in the 1840s.
Address: Rue des Martyrs 13, 6720 Arlon
Cimetière d'Arlon
The Arlon Cemetery is the burial place of the city of Arlon, Belgium. Opened in 1853, it has two sections: Catholic and Jewish.
It was created in 1853 during the maïorate of Pierre Hollenfeltz. Three years later, in 1856, a Jewish section was opened, facing Jerusalem and separated from the first part by a hedge. The reason for this second section is the existence of a strong Jewish community in Arlon in the 19th century. Before 1856, Jews who died in Arlon were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Luxembourg. Today, it is the oldest Jewish cemetery in the Walloon Region; together with the Dieweg cemetery in Uccle, they form a unique Jewish burial site in Belgium.
Today, the Jewish section of the cemetery has an abandoned look as the 99 graves have suffered from lack of maintenance. Many slabs have slipped and are overhanging their bases. Other stones have cracked. The growth of vegetation is controlled by the use of herbicide. In 2005, a restoration project led by two scientists from the Jewish Museum of Belgium in Brussels, Philippe Pierret and Olivier Hottois, in collaboration with young European volunteers from the Aktion Sühnezeichen Friedensdienste (Berlin) and the Jewish community of Arlon, contributed to the partial restoration of the 19th century Jewish square. A complete and illustrated inventory has been published in the Annales de l'Institut archéologique du Luxembourg. Cf. bibliography below.
In the common cemetery, the city of Arlon has been carrying out renovation work for several years, with the help of volunteers, and repairs, straightens and cleans the tombstones. This part also includes a military section.
The previous communal cemetery, located on rue des Thermes romains, was disused in 1853. Its site is still identifiable and ancient Roman baths have been located there. Various crosses from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries can still be seen there.
St. Martin's Church
The Saint-Martin church in Arlon is one of the three main churches of the city. Built from 1907 to 1914, it is of neo-gothic style.
It is an important place of worship in the commune.
Since 2002, the church is classified as a major heritage of Wallonia. The ensemble, with the exception of the organ, is also classified as Exceptional Heritage of the Walloon Region.
With its 97 meter high tower, it is the highest church building in Wallonia and is in the top ten of the highest church towers in Belgium.
The current dean is Father Wenceslas Mungimur.
Built by King Leopold II in order to give a grandiose image to Belgium, the Saint-Martin Church is the twin church of the Saints-Pierre-et-Paul Church in Ostend.
Address: Square Albert 1er 31, 6700 Arlon
Église Saint-Donat
Church
Address: Square Elisabeth 2, 6700 Arlon
Church of the Sacred Heart
The church of the Sacred Heart is a Romanesque-Byzantine Catholic religious building located in the rue des déportés, in Arlon, Belgium. Built at the end of the 19th century as the church of the Jesuit novitiate that adjoined it, it became a parish church at the end of the 20th century.
Address: Rue des Déportés, 6700 Arlon
Knippchen
The Knippchen is a small hill located in the Belgian city of Arlon, in the province of Luxembourg. It is the historical heart of the former city of Arlon and was occupied by the castle of the counts of Arlon and surrounded by ramparts. The church of Saint-Donat is located on top of it. The historical district that developed around it is called Hetchegass.