Hidden Brussels: A Local‘s Guide to Secret Places and Untold Stories

Brussels is filled with impressive architecture and art that adds to its old Belgian charm. On this walking tour, you‘ll explore several districts and find out how, despite being an important political hub and the capital of the European Union, there are quirky stories around every corner.

Starting outside the city‘s recently-restored Bourse, the former stock exchange, you‘ll head into the trendy Dansaert district, home to unique fashion stores and cool cafés. You‘ll see where Brussels was first settled as a simple village in damp marshland. You‘ll then wind your way to the Grand-Place of Brussels, one of the most beautiful squares in Europe, where you can admire some of the dramatic Baroque houses that were built after much of Brussels was reduced to rubble by French artillery in 1695. From there, you‘ll make your way to the upper town to see Manneken Pis, the city’s most visited statue, which is occasionally still dressed up in a strange ceremony that goes back to 1698. You’ll also pass a hidden stretch of the old city wall and La Fleur en Papier Doré, the café where Surrealist artists once met, en route to the aristocratic Sablon district. Here, you‘ll peruse the 60 symbolic statues around the Square of Petit Sablon before making your way to the elegant Place Royale and the buried ruins of a Renaissance palace that hardly anyone knows about. Our tour ends with one of the best views of Brussels, overlooking the Mont des Arts Garden.

On this 120-minute urban ramble, you‘ll also have the opportunity to:

• Find out why some of the city’s streets have four names
• Learn how to properly pronounce Beursschouwburg, the theatre with a sign demonstrating seven different ways to mispronounce its name
• Take in several of the city‘s quirky statues, including a dog peeing on a bollard, Men Shoveling Chairs (Scupstoel) on Brussels Town Hall, and the bronze figure of local hero Everard ‘t Serclaes
• Pass by Doctor Vinyl, the record store where DJs hunt for rare vinyls
• Pay your respects to Charles Buls, the mayor who saved the city‘s architectural heritage
• Find out about the destroyed palaces around Place du Grand Sablon (Grand Sablon Square)
• Become familiar with Brussels’ beautiful cobblestoned-streets
• Take in Prince Albert Barracks, once the Culemborg Palace where the Dutch Revolt began
• See the secret cellars where an ancient guild of crossbowmen still meet
• Hear about the vanished Senne River that once flowed through Brussels outside Halles Saint-Géry marketplace, where the city first began
• Walk part of the Comic Book Trail, a route that takes in more than 50 buildings decorated with scenes from comic books

If this sounds like your sort of tour, let me be your guide. I promise to show you some places that no one knows about.