Leuven Scavenger Hunt and Self-Guided Tour

The route: from M Leuven via the library and the market squares to Fonske

10 stops · about 25 min walking · start: M Leuven · finish: Fonske

The hunt starts at M Leuven, the city's art museum, and continues to Ladeuzeplein and Herbert Hooverplein by the University Library. From there you pass the old city wall in Sint-Donatus Park and St Michael's Church on Naamsestraat on the way to the Oude Markt, then reach the Town Hall, the Grote Markt and St Peter's Church, and finish at the Fonske statue. Since every clue sits on a façade, a statue or a square, you never queue at a ticket desk, and the app is just as happy to open with the Town Hall or the Oude Markt and rearrange the remaining stops around that choice.

Open the route map ↗

1. 

   1M LeuvenStart

   M Leuven is the city's museum of art, opened in 2009 in a building by the architect Stéphane Beel that joins new galleries to the house of the former Vander Kelen-Mertens museum. Its collection runs from late-medieval Brabant sculpture and painting to contemporary art.

2. 

   2Ladeuzeplein

   This wide square is closed by the University Library, designed by the American architect Whitney Warren and rebuilt with American donations after German troops burned the old library and its collections in August 1914. Its tall tower holds a carillon. In front of it stands Totem by Jan Fabre, a giant beetle pierced by a long needle, placed here in 2000.

3. 

   3Herbert Hooverplein

   This square beside the University Library is named after Herbert Hoover, who led the Commission for Relief in Belgium that fed the occupied country during the First World War, and who later became president of the United States. The name recalls the American help that also went into rebuilding the library after 1914.

4. 

   4Sint-Donatus Park

   This quiet park keeps a stretch of Leuven's first city wall, built in the 12th century, with the remains of several towers standing between the trees. It is a green resting place only a few steps from the busy Oude Markt.

5. 

   5St Michael's Church

   The Jesuits built St Michael's Church on Naamsestraat in the mid-17th century to a design by the Jesuit architect Willem Hesius. Its richly carved baroque façade is considered one of the finest in Belgium, and the church was restored after heavy damage in the Second World War.

6. 

   6Oude Markt

   The Oude Markt is a long rectangular square lined almost entirely with cafés and bars, which has earned it the nickname of the longest bar in Europe. In a corner sits the Kotmadam, a bronze statue of the landlady who traditionally rented rooms to Leuven's students.

7. 

   7Leuven Town Hall

   Leuven's late-Gothic Town Hall was built between 1439 and 1469 and completed by the master builder Matheus de Layens. Its façades carry 236 statues of scholars, artists, saints and local figures, added in the 19th century, and the carved bases below the niches show biblical scenes.

8. 

   8Grote Markt

   The Grote Markt is Leuven's main square, framed by the Town Hall on one side and St Peter's Church on the other. Opposite them stands the Tafelrond, a building with a richly decorated Gothic-style façade, and the square is the starting point of the city's main shopping streets.

9. 

   9St Peter's Church

   St Peter's Church is a Brabantine Gothic church begun around 1425 on the site of an older Romanesque church. Its west towers were planned to be very tall but were never finished because the ground was too unstable. Inside hangs Dirk Bouts' Last Supper, painted between 1464 and 1468.

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10. 

    10FonskeFinish

    Fonske, short for Fons Sapientiae or fountain of wisdom, is a bronze student who reads a book while pouring water into his own head. Jef Claerhout made it in 1975 for the 550th anniversary of the university, founded in 1425, and it has become a cheerful symbol of the student city.

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