St Mary's Church, Gdansk

St Mary's took roughly a century and a half to build and finished in the sixteenth century as one of the largest brick churches anywhere, big enough to hold a crowd counted in the thousands. The interior is whitewashed and lit by plain glass, so the effect is of pale space under a net vault rather than colour, and the furnishings stand out against it. The astronomical clock in the north transept, built in the fifteenth century, is about fourteen metres high and carries a calendar, planets and a procession of figures. The tower is a climb of over four hundred steps, mostly brick stairs and then timber, ending on a flat top above the roofs.

What you actually see

• The astronomical clock - a towering fifteenth century mechanism with calendar and moving figures.
• The net vault - the pale ribbed ceiling running the length of the nave.
• The tower climb - over four hundred steps to a flat top with the old town and the cranes below.
• The copy of the Last Judgement - the Memling altarpiece copy, the original held in the city museum.

When to go

May to September for the tower, which shuts in bad weather and high wind. Mornings are quieter, and the church closes to visitors during services and on Sunday mornings. Summer afternoons bring cruise groups and a queue at the tower stair, which is single file in places. The interior is cold and needs a layer even in July.

Honest expectations

The interior is bare compared with churches elsewhere in Europe, since much was lost and much of what stands is post-war restoration. The tower climb is long, warm and narrow with no lift and limited passing space, and the top is fenced with mesh that gets in the way of photographs. Cruise ship days make the whole main town crowded.

Nearby

The Long Market, the Motlawa waterfront with its great timber crane and the amber shops of Mariacka street.