Bremen Old Town Guided Walking Tour

Bremen Market Square, Town Hall and Roland

The Market Square is the heart of Bremen and the first long stop on this Bremen Old Town walking tour. The Town Hall was built between 1405 and 1410 as a Gothic hall and received its ornate Weser Renaissance facade between 1608 and 1612; it survived the Second World War almost untouched and was added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 2004 together with the stone Roland that stands in front of it. The Roland, carved in 1404 and more than five metres tall, holds a sword of justice and faces the cathedral as a symbol of the city's freedom from the bishop.

Your guide explains the carved figures on the facade, the merchants' guild house of the Schütting opposite and the parliament building on the square. Many visitors ask whether Bremen Market Square is worth visiting on its own; it is, but the stories of the Roland and the Town Hall are what make the square come alive, and you spend about twenty-five minutes here.

St. Petri Cathedral and the Bremen Town Musicians

Beside the Town Hall rises St. Petri Cathedral, whose two towers climb almost a hundred metres above the square. A bishop's church has stood on this spot since the late eighth century, and the present building grew in stages from the eleventh to the thirteenth century, with the twin-tower facade completed in the nineteenth. On this tour you see the cathedral from outside and hear why the bishop and the city council spent centuries at odds, which explains the position of the Roland in front of it.

On the west side of the Town Hall stands the bronze Bremen Town Musicians sculpture from 1953: a donkey, a dog, a cat and a rooster stacked on each other's backs, the heroes of the famous fairy tale set in Bremen. Rubbing the donkey's front legs is said to bring luck, which is why they shine. Allow a few minutes for photographs; the sculpture is small, so you need to look for it.

Böttcherstraße

Böttcherstraße is barely a hundred metres long, yet it is the most unusual street in Bremen. The lane of the medieval coopers, who made barrels for the port, was rebuilt between 1922 and 1931 by a Bremen coffee merchant as a showcase of red-brick Expressionist architecture, with sculpted facades, arched passages, a courtyard with a carillon and small museums and craft shops behind the doors. The carillon of porcelain bells plays at fixed times during the day, and a rotating panel beside it shows pioneers of ocean and air crossings.

Your walk starts at the Tourist Information in the Glockenspiel House on this street, so you see Böttcherstraße at the beginning and again as the guide leads you towards the river. The best time to visit Böttcherstraße is early afternoon, when the brick glows in the light, which is exactly when this tour runs.

The Schnoor Quarter

The Schnoor is the oldest part of Bremen, a knot of lanes between the cathedral and the Weser where fishermen, boatmen and craftsmen lived from the fifteenth century on. Its name comes from the Low German word for string, because the little houses are strung along the alleys like beads; some lanes are so narrow that two people cannot pass side by side. The quarter escaped wartime bombing and was restored from the 1950s, so today the timber-framed and brick houses hold handicraft shops, tea rooms, small galleries and a tiny chapel.

The Schnoor is the final part of the route, and most guests spend about half an hour here with the guide before staying on to explore by themselves. If you are wondering how to get to the Schnoor from the Market Square, it is a five-minute walk past the cathedral, and the tour makes that connection for you.

Bremen Old Town: planning your visit

Bremen's historic centre is compact and flat, which is why a two-hour walking tour covers all the main sights without hurry. The route is about two kilometres on cobblestones, paved squares and across tram tracks, with no steps on the standard route, so it is suitable for wheelchairs and pushchairs. The Market Square is a ten to fifteen-minute walk from Bremen main station, and trams stop at Domsheide, a few steps from the cathedral, so a Bremen Old Town walking tour fits easily into a day trip by train or a stop on a cruise itinerary.

After the tour you are close to the Schlachte, the promenade along the Weser with its moored historic ships and cafés, and to the shopping streets around Sögestraße. Our team is happy to suggest how to combine this walk with the other Bremen experiences on our site, such as the Town Hall interior tour or the underground tour.