Castle Square
The square the Germans bombed flat in 1939 — and Warsaw rebuilt stone by stone over decades.
Coming soon on iOS — be first to walk Warsaw offline.
This triangular plaza is where Warsaw's destruction and reconstruction become tangible. The Royal Castle on the east was deliberately blown up in September 1939, completely leveled by 1945, and only reopened to visitors in 1984. The Old Town around it earned UNESCO listing in 1980 as a rare example of near-total historic reconstruction. The square also carries a darker past: Russian troops — infantry and cavalry — massacred more than 100 civilians here on a single day in April 1861.
What to look for
- Sigismund's Column (southwest corner): erected 1644 by sculptor Clemente Molli, honoring King Sigismund III — Poland's first secular monument in column form, and older than almost everything else standing here
- The Royal Castle's east façade: every stone you see is reconstructed; the original was bombed in September 1939 and systematically demolished through 1944–45
- The escalator tucked into the square's edge: since 1949 it drops into the W-Z tunnel, which runs directly beneath Castle Square connecting east and west Warsaw
Open public square, no entry fee; it marks the northern start of the Royal Route heading south, and the Royal Castle beside it charges separate admission.
Castle Square is one of 36 sights worth the detour in Warsaw, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Warsaw pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Warsaw
- PGE Narodowy (Kazimierz Górski National Stadium)Poland's biggest football bowl hangs a retractable PVC roof from a central spire — when the mechanism works, it unfolds like a sail over 58,580 seats.
- Palace of Culture and ScienceStalin's skyscraper — Poles nicknamed it "elephant in lacy underwear" and never tore it down.
- Royal Castle in WarsawThe Nazis dynamited this building in 1944. Every room you walk through was rebuilt, stone by stone, between 1971 and 1984.
- Warsaw Old TownBombed flat in WWII and rebuilt from scratch — the world's first fully resurrected historic city core, now a UNESCO World Heritage site.
- National Museum in WarsawThe gallery that brought Nubian Christian art from a Sudanese cathedral to Warsaw.
- Wilanów PalaceBuilt for a warrior king while Poland still existed — and open as a museum since 1805.