UNESCO World Heritage List in Poland — 17 monuments

🕗 9 minutes | 3 December 2024 | Text Klara Krysiak

Poland brings together the best of multiculturalism, wildlife and folklore, and travelling through the country provides a unique experience and allows you to discover its new face. This uniqueness has been recognised by the United Nations, which has placed as many as 17 Polish sites on the prestigious UNESCO World Heritage List! Which UNESCO sites in Poland should you see at least once in your lifetime? You can find the answer in our guidebook.

UNESCO World Heritage Sites can be found in Krakow, Toruń, Zamość and Warsaw, among others. There are as many as 17 of them in total, and apart from their cultural and natural value, they are simply wonderful tourist attractions, for which our country is worth a trip. World Heritage Sites include castles, historic city areas, churches, mines, and even forests. You can find a complete list of heritage sites below!

The former capital of Poland, city of kings and tourist capital of Małopolska is a real treasure trove of national memorabilia and UNESCO monuments located in Poland. Krakow is called the cradle of Polish culture, not without reason — the number of monuments may make your head spin!

Among the oldest and most characteristic monuments of the World Heritage Site is the Old Town of Krakow, and more specifically the Main Market Square from the mid-13th century. Surrounded by rows of centuries-old town houses and palaces, it is the largest medieval town square in Europe. It is dominated by two imposing buildings — the Cloth Hall with its stalls continuing a centuries-old commercial tradition, and St Mary's Basilica with its Gothic altar by Veit Stoss.

When visiting the UNESCO-listed sites in Krakow, it is impossible to miss such places as the Wawel Royal Castle, Collegium Maius and the Czartoryski Museum, where the famous ‘Lady with an Ermine’ — one of Leonardo da Vinci's most magnificent paintings. A few steps away from the Old Town, on the other hand, is Kazimierz, the former Jewish district, famous for its artistic cafés, art galleries and lively nightlife. 

Book flights to Krakow and see the heart of Krakow — Szeroka Street with its historic synagogues, Podgórze with the remains of the Jewish ghetto, and Oskar Schidler's factory, famous for the cult film ‘Schidler's List’ by Steven Spielberg (Steven Spielberg's 1993 cult film). Trade, art and great culture — Krakow's UNESCO-listed sites in Poland will provide plenty of attractions for everyone!

The UNESCO World Heritage List also includes the attractions of today's capital city, Warsaw's Old Town. Almost destroyed during World War II, it rose like a phoenix from the ashes in just a few years to once again impress with its colourful bourgeois town houses, elegant palaces and majestic Royal Castle. 

Today, the historic part of Warsaw is teeming with big-city life. There is no shortage of traditional restaurants, café gardens, souvenir shops and art galleries — everything is at your fingertips! To appreciate the vastness of this place, climb the bell tower of St Anne's Church — the view is stunning!

At the end of your tour, don't forget to reach for a local delicacy — the Zygmuntówka cake. It's an unusual meringue, consisting of an almond bottom, chocolate cream, whipped cream and cranberry jam, which looks and tastes delicious. Book flights to Warsaw — place you must visit when discovering the most important UNESCO sites in Poland.

Book flights to Wrocław — the European Capital of Culture and the seat of government of the Lower Silesian Voivodeship. As well as the place where you will see one of the engineering marvels of the 20th century and a unique UNESCO site in Poland. The Centennial Hall was built in 1913 for exhibitions presenting the history and economic achievements of Lower Silesia.

The design by local architect Max Berg incorporated innovative reinforced concrete technology, not previously used on such a large scale. The proposal did not please city councillors, who compared the hall's skeleton to… a hat box. Fortunately, they quickly changed their minds, and as a result, Wrocław gained a building that has become a permanent part of world architectural history. Today, the Centennial Hall serves as an entertainment and conference centre, hosting business, sport and cultural events. The surroundings of the hall also have much to offer — the Japanese Garden or the Wrocław Zoo evoke similar emotions to this unique UNESCO site in Poland!

Built far away from large urban centres, Zamość is a perfect example of the Renaissance concept of the ‘ideal city’. Founded in 1580 by Chancellor Jan Zamoyski, it combines sublime beauty with the functionality of a city located on an important trade route. As planned by the architect Bernardo Morandi, you will find the best of Italian and Central European architectural traditions here. 

The centrepiece of Zamość Old Town, a UNESCO site in Poland, is the imposing Rynek Wielki with its lofty town hall tower and the magnificent St. Thomas Collegiate Church. The square is surrounded by burgher houses with arcades, including historic Armenian houses decorated with beautiful bas-reliefs and ornaments. The city was also once surrounded by powerful fortifications, including seven bastions, the relics of which are open to the public.

A walk along Grodzka Street will complete the work — the Zamoyska Academy, the ‘Synagogue’ Centre, the former Chancellor's Palace and the Arsenal are all monuments that create the true atmosphere of the city. And all this just 90 kilometres from Lublin! Come to Zamość and discover for yourself the most beautiful UNESCO sites and objects in Poland.

Among the most important UNESCO sites in Poland, the largest brick fortress of medieval Europe could not be missed — the Teutonic Castle in Malbork is the first known example of a regular four-winged defensive fortress. Built from 4.5 million bricks, it consists of three main buildings: High Castle, Middle Castle and Lower Castle, separated from each other by a high defensive wall and extensive dry moats.

It is worth starting your tour of the Teutonic Castle in Malbork from the oldest part of the complex with St Anne's Chapel, known as the resting place of the Grand Masters of the Teutonic Order. In the Middle Castle, the Great Refectory and a rich amber collection await, and the Lower Castle… here you will see what life was like in former centuries. The arsenal, stables, and brewery are a treat not only for history buffs, so check out flights to Gdańsk and plan a unique trip to nearby Malbork — a must-see UNESCO site in Poland!

The list of cultural heritage sites also includes Toruń's medieval urban complex: the Old and New Towns and the ruins of a Teutonic castle. There are also remnants of ancient fortifications in the form of fragments of walls, gates, towers, and the Leaning Tower, about which you have surely heard many legends.

But, but! Toruń's medieval urban complex is not the only one of the city's heritage sites. The Copernicus House, located on the street named after him, where the famous astronomer was born, also attracts crowds. Today, the building has been converted into the Copernican Museum, which shows the former life of a bourgeois family. There you will also find an impressive model of 16th century Toruń.

Bialowieza Forest is a place where nature rules and Polish bison live under the centuries-old, 50-metre-high trees. There are more than 1,000 of them! The Bialowieza National Park itself, in turn, has an area of 150,000 hectares and lies partly in Poland and partly in Belarus (its western part, located in Poland, covers 62,500 hectares).

What attracts tourists to the Bialowieza Forest is its natural ecosystem: unregulated watercourses and wetlands that are home to many species of plants, fungi and animals. The Bialowieza Forest is also very impressive with its old trees — there are even stops along the most interesting specimens of the ‘Royal Oaks Route’ tourist route, and the trees themselves are named after Polish rulers.

Poland's list of cultural heritage sites is extremely diverse. It includes national parks, churches and… 13th century salt mines — underground, self-sufficient cities, equipped with ventilation, drainage, lighting, and transport systems.

The King's salt mines can be traversed on foot or by boat — there are plenty of adits, grottoes, corridors, and underground lakes that stretch for almost 300 kilometres, at depths of up to 327 metres. If you would like to learn a bit more about this astonishing place, you can take a walk along a two-kilometre tourist route, during which you will see: the Copernicus Chamber, St Kinga's Chapel and a monument to John Paul II.

Interestingly, underground there are also innovative medical treatments, a spa, a disco, and a stable where the horses employed in the mine once rested. It's no wonder this place has earned its place on the World Heritage List!

One of the most magnificent places of worship in Europe is Kalwaria Zebrzydowska — a complex of a Passion and Marian sanctuary consisting of: Basilica of Our Lady of the Angels, the monastery of the Bernardine Fathers and a complex of chapels. You will also find Jerusalem accents, the idea of which was conceived by the architect Paul Baudarth; the Skawinka River, the Żar Mountain and the Lanckorońska Mountain. The biggest attraction here is the Infant Image of Our Lady of Kalwaria — it is because of it that Kalwaria Zebrzydowska is visited by more than a million people every year.

Poland's UNESCO list also includes deeply heart-rending places such as Auschwitz-Birkenau, a symbol of war and the Holocaust. The State Museum and Memorial was opened on the site of the former concentration camp in 1947 and covers the area of its two surviving parts: Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau.

Auschwitz-Birkenau is both a research and educational facility. It focuses on collecting, preserving and providing access to documents and historical artefacts, and each year the museum is visited by more than one million people from all over the world. The day of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, 27 January, has been formally designated by the United Nations as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Did you know that the beautiful churches of southern Małopolska form the Krakow Wooden Architecture Route? There are as many as 125 of them in total, and master carpenters built them mostly from larch and fir wood. Today, these wooden churches are true architectural masterpieces that conceal priceless treasures — such as polychrome with biblical themes. Interestingly, the churches of southern Little Poland are still living places of religious worship. They also host cultural events, such as the holiday concert series ‘Music enchanted in wood’.

Imagine boundless meadows, trees with spreading branches, lakes, and rivers… This is Muskauer Park, one of Europe's most extensive historical park arrangements, which covers almost 700 hectares. You'll find 800,000 trees and 42,000 shrubs there, and the whole thing is crossed by the Lusatian Neisse, which is the natural border between Poland and Germany.

Are you familiar with the onion-shaped cross-shaped logs crowning the roofs? Or perhaps your attention was once drawn to the shimmering Byzantine splendour of the iconostasis? If so, you will surely easily picture beautiful wooden churches, set on rural hills. There are almost a hundred of them in the Carpathian Mountains alone!

The UNESCO list in Poland includes as many as eight wooden churches in the region of the Western Carpathians, and half of them come from the Subcarpathian region. These are:

• St Paraskeva Church in Radruż,
• Orthodox Church of the Nativity of the Holy Mother of God in Chotyniec,
• Orthodox Church of St. Michael the Archangel in Smolnik,
• St Michael the Archangel Church in Turzansk.

You can admire the other four wooden Orthodox churches in Little Poland (Powroźnik, Owczary, Kwiatoń, Brunary Wyżne). The oldest of them date from the 16th century and the youngest from the 19th century.

We are moving from purely wooden churches to those built of wood and clay, or more precisely, on a wooden frame filled with briquettes of straw and clay. The Churches of Peace in Jawor and Świdnica, as they are referred to, were built in the 17th century and were meant to be a gesture of reconciliation between Catholics and Protestants that would end the longest war in Europe.

Today, events held in the churches are guided by the ideas of cooperation, tolerance and international integration. From May to September, their interiors are in turn filled with music and singing, and artists and tourists from all over the world flock to the Churches of Peace in Jawor and Świdnica.

How about a visit to Tarnowskie Góry? After all, it is one of the most powerful bullion mining centres in Upper Silesia! At the end of the 18th century, a steam engine was put into operation here to dewater the mine workings, and at the beginning of the 19th century, the first mining school was opened. In turn, the local mines of lead, silver and zinc ores, together with an innovative underground water management system, made it onto the honoured UNESCO list in Poland.

The site of the prehistoric striped flint mines in Krzemionki is the youngest UNESCO-listed site in Poland. It has been protected because of its unique underground architecture and perfectly preserved post-mining landscape. In turn, Krzemionki — mines from the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, which is one of the largest and best-preserved sites of its kind in the world — has been recognised as a historical monument.

The Krzemionki mining field itself covers an area of around 80 hectares, with more than 4,000 mines. There is also an underground route of almost 500 metres, as well as a Neolithic settlement where archaeological workshops and museum lessons are organised.

The second natural object on the UNESCO list after the Białowieża National Park are the primeval Carpathian beech forests. They are located in the territory of the Bieszczady National Park and are part of a supra-regional entry called ‘Ancient and primeval beech forests of the Carpathians and other regions of Europe’, which consists of 94 sections in 18 different countries.

In Poland, beech forests lie in the most inaccessible corners of the Bieszczady National Park:

• on the slopes of Połonina Wetlińska and Smerek,
• in the Border Range,
• in the Upper Solinka Valley,
• in the valleys of the Terebowiec and Wołosatka streams.

The whole of the above area of approximately 3,300 hectares is under strict protection.