Brzeg: Piast Castle, Old Town and the Oder

Old Town and Piast architectural heritage

The Old Town retains its granite and basalt street and pavement surfaces. It is considered a well-preserved example of a town founded in the mid-13th century under Magdeburg or Środa law. The Old Town is listed in the heritage register of Opole Voivodeship under decisions No. 132/54 of 23 October 1954 and No. 622/59 of 13 November 1959.

The castle of the Silesian Piasts dates back to the 13th century and was extensively remodelled in the 16th century. The Renaissance residence is particularly known for its Renaissance gate, whose richly articulated façade is considered a high point of Silesian Piast art. The castle, including its gate and the Chapel of St Hedwig, was declared a Historic Monument by a decree of the President of the Republic of Poland on 10 December 2018.

The Chapel of St Hedwig, associated with the castle, is one of the largest necropolises of the Silesian Piasts. Forty-three members of the Legnica–Brzeg line are buried there. The town hall also tells the story of the city: the Renaissance building by Jakub Parr and Bernard Niuron was built between 1570 and 1577 on the site of the Gothic town hall, which burned down in 1569. The Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, near the castle, contains illusionistic frescoes by the Silesian painter Johann Kuben (1697–1770).

Museum, art and city experiences

The Museum of the Silesian Piasts displays Silesian religious art from the Gothic to the Baroque period, including paintings by Michael Leopold Willmann. The permanent exhibition “Kresy. Ocalone wspomnienia” offers another perspective: it recalls the eastern borderlands of the former Republic of Poland through the eyes of people who were expelled from there and settled in the Recovered Territories. The exhibition includes more than 2,500 objects donated by the public; 1,000 of them are on display.

Tourist Route No. 1 leads from the square by the Wrocław Gate, past the amphitheatre, Central Park, the moat, St Nicholas’s Church and the town hall, to the castle. St Nicholas’s Church is a Gothic, three-aisled basilica built between 1370 and 1417 on the site of an earlier parish church. The tourist information point can arrange guided tours of Brzeg for organised groups.

The Brzeskie Cultural Centre also broadens the range of city experiences: it runs a cinema and a contemporary art gallery, and offers arts education. This lets you focus your stay more on architecture and history or on art and culture.

Parks, the Oder and water activities

Brzeg has six parks covering more than 90 hectares in total, including four in the city centre. There are also around 33 hectares of other green spaces. The parks are home to around 150 species of trees and shrubs from Europe, Asia and North America. Juliusza Peppela Park, formerly called Freedom Park, was established between 1901 and 1905 and is the city’s largest park.

All parks are open to visitors. Modernised paths can be safely used with wheelchairs, scooters and bicycles; some paths are illuminated at night. Birdwatchers can spot great cormorants, grey herons, mute swans, goosanders and kingfishers along the urban stretch of the Oder throughout the year. The water park offers slides and hydromassage facilities. Marina Brzeg is a water tourism facility with a passenger area for small tourist boats and an area for canoes and yachts used for small-scale tourist traffic.

Getting there and more destination pages

Brzeg can be reached by train and via National Roads 39 and 94. Access to the A4 motorway is via the Przylesie interchange, exit 190. These transport links give you various options to factor your journey into your travel plans.

If you would like to explore places beyond Brzeg, you can find destination pages here for Kopice, Borkowice, Brieg, Pisarzowice, Sulisław and Grodków.

For the broader travel overview: Opole.

More destinations

More places within the same destination:

Olesno, Strzelecki.