Antwerp

Every Friday, instead of having traditional classroom instruction, our class goes on an excursion to a site somewhere in/around Paris. The location changes each week, but on Friday June 28th, we went to Antwerp, a city in northern Belgium. I have a separate post about the Plantin-Moretus museum we went to see, but this post will focus on the city itself.

In Dutch, Antwerp is Antwerpen.

Some of the main buildings were under construction, including the city hall and the cathedral, but they were still quite beautiful.

This is the cathedral; you can see some of the construction on the left side.

There were a lot of street art and decorations throughout the city, with styles ranging from historical statues to walls painted to look like contemporary comic-book panels.

A sculpture of Mary that was on some random wall

This is just the enterance to some random building, but I thought it was pretty

A lot of the buildings have really pretty facades, especially the ones on the main square (which is actually more of a main triangle).

One interesting thing to note was how the old facades and obvious history was really mixed in with more modern architecture. Unlike many parts of Paris, which are either very modern or very historic, most of Antwerp seemed to be simultaneously old and contemporary.

After awhile, though, many of the buildings seemed very similar. Notice that the photos above and below both have modern stores topped with female statues standing next to columns, arched windows, decorative golden eagles, and pointed tops. I guess that was just the preferred architectural style of those times.

There were a lot of little courtyards and alleyways that made streets more unique and worth exploring, however.

A small, room-size courtyard that was tucked away between buildings

Some of these small courtyards were turned into quaint little dinning patios by local restaurants; I really liked the idea.

Another thing worth noting about Antwerp is the train station. Normally, I'd gloss over this part, but the station was actually quite beautiful.

Our train home was delayed a lot, which was a little bit trying after a long day touring the city, but it gave me more time to take photos. I've made trying to get photos without people in them into a little bit of a game for myself.

If you're willing to wait for the exact right moment, you can sometimes snag a picture before someone walks through, even if you're in a busy train station.