Warsaw Old Town

Warsaw's Old Town is on the UNESCO list for an unusual reason: not for being old, but for how it was put back. Almost nothing standing here today is original. The quarter was rebuilt through the late 1940s and 1950s from eighteenth-century townscape paintings by Bernardo Bellotto, from pre-war survey drawings and from the measured records of architecture students, which is why the facades are accurate and the buildings behind them are not. The market square, the Royal Castle and the brick barbican are all reconstructions of that campaign.

What you actually see

• The Old Town Market Square - the colourful reconstructed square with the mermaid statue.
• The Royal Castle - the rebuilt royal residence and its restored interiors.
• The Barbican and old walls - the reconstructed medieval fortifications.
• St John's Cathedral - the rebuilt Gothic cathedral.

When to go

Spring to autumn for terraces and mild weather; December for a Christmas market. A clear day flatters the colourful facades.

Honest expectations

Knowing it is a meticulous reconstruction rather than a survival changes how you read it, and that is the real interest of the place. It is smaller and quieter than Krakow's. Its power is the resilience it represents as much as its beauty.

Nearby

The Royal Route leads south to the palaces; the POLIN museum of Polish Jewish history is nearby.