Warsaw’s Old Town tells one of the most extraordinary stories of any city in Europe — 85% destroyed by the Nazis in 1944, then painstakingly rebuilt from old paintings, architectural drawings, and collective memory into a UNESCO World Heritage Site that now looks as it did in the 18th century. This post accompanies the YouTube walking tour “WARSAW Walking Tour 4K — Stunning Old Town & Modern City,” which explores both the rebuilt historic core and the contemporary city around it. It is the companion to your warsaw walking tour.

About This Walking Tour

This 4K walking tour covers both the rebuilt Old Town — Castle Square, the colourful Old Town Market Square, and the New Town — and the broader modern city of Warsaw, showing how a 21st-century capital has grown up around and alongside its reconstructed medieval heart. The video covers Castle Square (Plac Zamkowy) dominated by Sigismund’s Column (1644) and the Royal Castle, rebuilt between 1971 and 1984 from rubble after its deliberate destruction by German forces. The Old Town Market Square, surrounded by colourful pastel-painted burgher houses reconstructed to their 18th-century appearance, is a remarkable achievement of architectural recreation.

The walk also includes the Royal Route (Krakowskie Przedmieście and Nowy Świat), the grand boulevard linking the Old Town to Łazienki Park, passing the University of Warsaw, the Presidential Palace, and Chopin’s monument. Łazienki Park, the 18th-century royal park with the Palace on the Water reflected in its lake, is one of Warsaw’s great public spaces.

Highlights of Warsaw

Castle Square (Plac Zamkowy) with Sigismund’s Column has been the symbolic heart of Warsaw since the 17th century. The adjacent Royal Castle, systematically looted and dynamited by the Germans after the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, was rebuilt entirely by voluntary public donation — Polish citizens contributed not just money but rescued architectural fragments — and reopened in 1984. Old Town Market Square (Rynek Starego Miasta), rebuilt to its 14th-century proportions and 18th-century facades, was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1980 as “an outstanding example of a near-total reconstruction of a span of history covering the 13th to the 20th centuries.” The Mermaid of Warsaw (Syrenka) — a mermaid with sword and shield, the city’s symbol — appears in fountains and statues throughout the Old Town. Łazienki Park contains the famous Chopin Statue (1926), under which free outdoor piano recitals take place every Sunday afternoon in summer, playing Chopin’s music as he intended it to be heard. Praga, the east-bank district that survived the war’s destruction largely intact, offers a raw, unrestored contrast to the rebuilt Old Town and has developed a distinct cultural scene around its pre-war industrial buildings.

A Brief History of Warsaw

Warsaw became Poland’s capital in 1596 when King Sigismund III moved his court from Kraków. The city was devastated by Swedish invasions in the 17th century (“the Deluge”), partially rebuilt, and then reached its 18th-century Baroque apogee under the last Polish king Stanisław August Poniatowski, who commissioned the Łazienki complex. After Poland’s partition and disappearance from the map of Europe between 1795 and 1918, Warsaw re-emerged as the capital of the restored Polish Republic. The German occupation from 1939 killed approximately 200,000 of Warsaw’s 370,000 Jews in the Holocaust; the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of April 1943 was the largest Jewish revolt of the war. Following the Warsaw Uprising of August–October 1944, Hitler ordered the city razed building by building. Soviet forces crossed the Vistula in January 1945 to find a wasteland.

Practical Tips

Warsaw is in the Central European Time zone (UTC+1, summer UTC+2). The currency is the Polish zloty (PLN). Polish is the language; English is widely spoken. Warsaw Centralna is the main train station, on Metro Line M1 and M2. The Old Town is walkable from the centre; Metro Line M1 serves the Świętokrzyska area near Nowy Świat. Łazienki Park is free to enter; free Chopin concerts take place at noon and 4 PM on Sundays from May to September (weather permitting). The Warsaw Rising Museum, which documents the 1944 uprising, is one of the finest history museums in Europe.

Watch & Explore More

The 4K video above shows both the rebuilt Old Town and the modern city surrounding it — an excellent orientation for Warsaw visitors. More walks at @walkingtoursvideoscom. Related guides: Krakow: Old Town to Wawel and Berlin: Brandenburg Gate to Museum Island.