Antwerp and Bruges were both built on the same thing: merchants who got rich on cloth and trade between the twelfth and sixteenth centuries and put the money into houses. Bruges was the first, a port on a tidal channel that silted up in the fifteenth century and left the city preserved by its own decline. Antwerp took over, became the richest city in Europe for a stretch of the sixteenth century, and has kept rebuilding ever since.
The result is two cities full of merchant houses, and in both the best hotels are inside them rather than beside them.
The two cities, and how different they are
Bruges is the museum piece: a walled medieval centre of canals and gabled houses, almost entirely intact, and receiving enormous numbers of day visitors. Between ten and five in season the centre is dense. Before nine and after seven it empties and becomes extraordinary.
Antwerp is a working city of half a million with a container port, a diamond district, a fashion academy that produced a generation of designers, and Rubens. It has the restaurants, the shopping and the nightlife that Bruges does not.
They are an hour apart by train, which makes doing both straightforward, and most trips should.
The nine below are grouped by city.
Antwerp
The larger, livelier one. Fashion, food and Rubens.
Botanic Sanctuary Antwerp - The Leading Hotels of the World occupies a complex of five listed monasteries and abbey buildings dating back to the fourteenth century, restored over a decade, with a spa in the cellars and gardens between the wings. It is the most ambitious hotel conversion in Belgium.
Botanic Sanctuary Antwerp - The Leading Hotels of the World
Antwerp centre · 5★ · $$$$
Five listed monastery buildings with a cellar spa
Check availabilityaugust sits in a converted building near the cathedral, designed throughout by a Belgian architect known for restraint, with a small room count and a courtyard. It is the most quietly considered hotel in the country.
august
Het Groen Kwartier, Antwerp · 5★ · $$$$
A restrained conversion by a leading Belgian architect
Check availabilityHotel Julien occupies two merchant houses on the Korte Nieuwstraat with a courtyard, a rooftop terrace and an interior that leans contemporary against the old bones.
Hotel Julien
Near Antwerp cathedral · 4★ · $$$
Two merchant houses with a courtyard and roof terrace
Check availabilityDe Witte Lelie sits in a seventeenth-century house on a quiet street with a handful of rooms, a garden and the feel of staying in a private home.
Hotel FRANQ occupies a former bank on the Leopold de Waelplaats in the museum quarter, with a good restaurant and rooms that are larger than the old-town conversions.
Hotel FRANQ
Antwerp museum quarter · 4★ · $$$
A former bank with larger rooms than the old town
Check availabilityBruges
The intact medieval centre, best before nine and after seven.
Dukes’ Palace – by Dukes’ Hotel Collection occupies a fifteenth-century palace once owned by the Dukes of Burgundy, with a Gothic hall, a garden and a position a minute from the Markt. It is the grandest building any hotel in Bruges holds.
Dukes’ Palace – by Dukes’ Hotel Collection
Bruges, off the Markt · 5★ · $$$$
A fifteenth-century Burgundian palace with a garden
Check availabilityHotel Heritage sits in a nineteenth-century mansion near the Markt with a rooftop terrace, a small spa and interiors that are traditional rather than designed.
Hotel Heritage
Near the Markt, Bruges · 4★ · $$$
Rooftop terrace and a small spa in a mansion
Check availabilityRelais Bourgondisch Cruyce, A Luxe Worldwide Hotel occupies a run of connected canal houses on the Groenerei with rooms directly over the water, which in Bruges is the position everyone wants.
Relais Bourgondisch Cruyce, A Luxe Worldwide Hotel
Groenerei, Bruges · 4★ · $$$$
Connected canal houses with rooms over the water
Check availabilityHotel De Orangerie by CW Hotel Collection - Small Luxury Hotels of the World sits in a converted patrician house with a walled garden, a pool and a quieter position a few streets from the centre.
Hotel De Orangerie by CW Hotel Collection - Small Luxury Hotels of the World
Bruges centre · 4★ · $$$
Walled garden a few streets from the crowds
Check availabilityWhat we have left off
The bed and breakfasts across Bruges are excluded, and in a city of small historic houses they are a substantial and often lovely part of the accommodation. They are guest houses rather than hotels.
What to do
In Bruges, be out at seven in the morning. The Markt, the Burg and the canals with nobody in them is the entire reason to sleep there rather than day-tripping from Brussels.
Climb the Belfry, see the Groeningemuseum for the Flemish Primitives, and the Michelangelo Madonna in the Church of Our Lady, which is the only sculpture of his to leave Italy in his lifetime.
In Antwerp, the Rubens House, the Plantin-Moretus printing museum, which is a UNESCO site and one of the best small museums in Europe, and the MAS for the view over the port.
Shop the fashion district around Nationalestraat and the ModeMuseum. Antwerp's designers are the reason the city has the reputation it does.
Eat Flemish and drink properly. Belgian beer is a serious tradition and the cafés in both cities take it seriously.
Practical notes
Brussels airport is 45 minutes from Antwerp and an hour and a quarter from Bruges by train. Both cities are on direct lines from Brussels and from each other.
May, June and September are ideal. Bruges is at its most crowded from July to August and at Christmas, when the market fills the Markt. Winter otherwise is cold, quiet and atmospheric.
Both centres are compact and pedestrian. Do not drive into Bruges.
Explore 4 & 5 Star Antwerp and Bruges Hotels
Questions people actually ask
Antwerp or Bruges?
Both, an hour apart. Bruges for the medieval centre, Antwerp for food, fashion and a working city.
Is Bruges too crowded?
Between ten and five in season, yes. Staying overnight is the answer and it transforms the place.
Is Antwerp worth two nights?
Yes. It has the restaurants, the shopping and two or three genuinely excellent museums.
How many nights?
Four. Two in each.