The Market Square, the Rynek, is the centre of Wrocław's Old Town and one of the largest medieval market squares in Europe, covering about 3.6 hectares. In its middle stands a whole block of buildings with not one but two town halls. Look closely at that block: it is turned about seven degrees off the line of the square around it, and no one has fully explained why.
Market Square at a glance
- Where: in the centre of the Old Town, a short walk south of the Oder; ten streets lead into it, two at each corner.
- Created: laid out in the 13th century, when the town received its charter under German town law; the plan was fixed after the Mongol invasion of 1241.
- What it is today: a pedestrian square lined with restaurants, cafés and shops, with the Old Town Hall housing the Museum of Burgher Art.
- Time needed: an hour to walk all four sides and the lanes of the central block; longer if you visit the museum.
From medieval market to rebuilt square
Duke Henry the Bearded founded the town with its market square around 1232, and it was re-founded in 1241–42 after the Mongol invasion. The square was laid out along the Via Regia trade route and divided into plots of equal width; over the centuries these were split and merged into the 60 numbered properties of today. Many houses still carry traditional names taken from the signs on their façades, such as Under the Griffins and Under the Blue Sun. The Gothic Old Town Hall took about 250 years to build, from the late 13th century onwards, and the New Town Hall next to it followed in 1860–64.
Around 1900 much of the central block was replaced by offices and shops, and in 1931 a ten-storey modernist office building rose at Rynek 11. The siege of 1945 left the square badly damaged, and after the war it was rebuilt largely by settlers from Poland's former eastern lands, mostly to its 18th-century appearance. When the paving was renewed in the late 1990s, archaeologists found the foundations of the old Great Scales, medieval cloth halls and stalls.
What to look for
- The Old Town Hall: walk around it to see the stepped Gothic gables, the oriels and the richly carved east façade, the side most often photographed.
- The pillory: the stone pillory south-east of the Town Hall is a replica of the one where people were publicly flogged from 1492 into the 18th century.
- Aleksander Fredro: the seated bronze of the Polish comic playwright was brought from Lviv in 1956. It replaced a statue of Kaiser Wilhelm that stood here until the end of the war.
- The house signs: look up for griffins, suns and other emblems that gave the houses their names, and compare the façades, from Gothic to Art Nouveau.
- Rynek 11: the plain ten-storey block from 1931 is the odd one out among the gabled houses and shows how close the square came to a modern makeover.
- The dwarfs: small bronze figures hide on pavements, ledges and lamp posts around the square, often in funny poses.
Why Wrocław has dwarfs
The dwarfs, krasnale in Polish, began as a protest. In the 1980s the Orange Alternative movement painted cartoon dwarfs on the patches of paint the authorities used to cover anti-government slogans, and used them in absurd street happenings that mocked the communist regime. In the early 2000s the city started placing bronze dwarfs around the centre in memory of the movement. Today there are hundreds, and hunting for them has become a favourite game for visitors.
Tips for your visit
- Come early in the morning to see the façades without crowds and terraces; in the evening the square is busy and lit up.
- Walk through the narrow lanes inside the central block, such as Sukiennice, to see the backs of the houses and small shops.
- Leave time to look for dwarfs: they are knee-high, so look down as well as up.
- Combine the square with the flower stalls of Plac Solny and the Hansel and Gretel houses next to St Elizabeth's Church, both just off the corners.
Nearby
- Plac Solny (Salt Square): the smaller square off the south-west corner, once a market for salt, today known for its round-the-clock flower stalls.
- St Elizabeth's Church and Hansel and Gretel: the tall Gothic church off the north-west corner, with two small houses joined by an arch at its gate.
- University of Wrocław: the long Baroque main building by the Oder, home to the ornate Aula Leopoldina, a short walk north.
- The Passage: Jerzy Kalina's bronze pedestrians sinking into the pavement and rising again on the other side of the street, a walk south along Świdnicka Street.
See Wrocław with World City Trail
Our Wrocław scavenger hunt turns the city into a game you play on your phone. The route links 10 stops and takes around three hours, with about 58 minutes of walking. It includes The Passage sculptures and Copernicus Park. You can play in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Dutch or Polish.
If you prefer a different format, there is also a self-guided walking tour and an outdoor escape game in Wrocław.
Play the Wrocław scavenger hunt →
Take the self-guided walking tour of Wrocław →
Play the outdoor escape game in Wrocław →
Facts checked in October 2026.