Lausanne

Top things to do in Lausanne

1. 01

   Cathédrale Notre-Dame - the Gothic cathedral and its night watchman

   history culture arts 👍 Popular

   The finest Gothic church in Switzerland, consecrated in 1275 with the pope and the German king present, keeps a painted south portal, a 13th-century rose window and a huge organ. From the belfry a watchman still calls the hours into the night, a job unbroken since 1405, and the terrace beside it looks clear across the roofs to the lake.

2. 02

   Musée Olympique - the Olympic capital's own museum

   culture arts history 👍 Popular

   Set in a sculpture park above the Ouchy shore, the museum runs from the ancient games through Coubertin's revival to the torches, medals and kit of every modern edition. It is the visitor-facing half of a city that also holds the IOC, dozens of international federations and the sport arbitration court.

3. 03

   Collection de l'Art Brut - Dubuffet's outsider art

   culture arts ⭐ Highly recommended

   The painter Jean Dubuffet gave his collection of art made outside the art world to the city, and it hangs in a dark, deliberately unlabelled-feeling chateau north of the centre. Work by patients, prisoners, mystics and recluses, much of it made from whatever was to hand. It is the most singular museum in the country and unlike anything else in town.

4. 04

   Plateforme 10 - three museums beside the station

   culture arts

   A rail yard next to the railway station was rebuilt as an arts quarter holding the cantonal fine arts museum, the Photo Elysée photography museum and mudac for design and applied arts, grouped around an open plaza. Two of them share one building, so a single afternoon covers all three without crossing the city.

5. 05

   Ouchy - the lakefront quays and Château d'Ouchy

   scenic 👍 Popular

   The old fishing port is now the city's front garden: a long plane-shaded promenade, a turreted chateau turned hotel, moored paddle steamers and lawns full of people on any warm evening. Walking east takes you along the shore towards Lutry and the first vineyards; walking west reaches the parks and beaches at Vidy.

6. 06

   Escaliers du Marché and Place de la Palud - the old town on foot

   history scenic

   Place de la Palud has the Fountain of Justice, a market twice a week and a town hall clock with figures that turn on the hour. From its corner the Escaliers du Marché, a roofed wooden stairway, climbs straight to the cathedral - the shortest and oldest route between the market and the church above it.

7. 07

   The m2 metro - Switzerland's only metro, and a very steep one

   scenic

   Driverless trains run from the lake at Ouchy up through the station, the Flon and the old town to the ridge at Croisettes, climbing hard enough that the carriages are stepped inside. It is the steepest adhesion metro anywhere, and the simplest way to deal with a city built on a slope.

8. 08

   Tour de Sauvabelin - the wooden tower above the city

   nature wildlife scenic

   Above the centre, the Sauvabelin woods hold a small lake with ducks and a beech-log spiral tower a few hundred steps high. From the platform the view takes in the city roofs, the whole sweep of the lake and the Alps behind Evian. Buses run up, or you climb through the forest from the cathedral.

9. 09

   Palais de Rumine - the cantonal museums on Riponne

   culture arts history

   A heavy Florentine-style palace that once held the university and now houses the cantonal collections under one roof: archaeology and history, geology, zoology and the money museum. The stuffed-animal halls and the mammoth are the reason it works so well with children, and the staircase is worth the entry on its own.

10. 10

    Fondation de l'Hermitage - exhibitions in a hillside villa

    culture arts scenic

    A 19th-century country house in its own park on the slope north of the centre, given to the city and run for temporary shows of painting, usually one big name at a time. The garden looks straight back at the cathedral and the lake, and it is the most pleasant walk to any museum here.

11. 11

    Musée Romain de Lausanne-Vidy - where the city started

    history

    Lausanne began at the water's edge as the Roman town of Lousonna, and its forum, harbour district and street plan lie under the lakeside parkland at Vidy. The small museum is built over part of the site, with the excavated ruins outside it and the city's beaches, theatre and running paths all around.

12. 12

    Papet vaudois, perch fillets and Chasselas - eating in Lausanne

    food

    Vaud's dish is papet: leeks and potatoes stewed under a saucisson vaudois. Lake perch fillets fried in butter with lemon are the standard by the water, fondue moitié-moitié the winter default, and the white to drink with any of it is Chasselas off the Lavaux terraces up the road.

13. 13

    Le Flon - the warehouse quarter after dark

    nightlife music shopping

    A gorge of old goods sheds below the centre, rebuilt as a grid of low blocks holding bars, clubs, cinemas and shops. It is the reason a city this size has a nightlife at all, helped by a very large student population, and the m2 runs through the middle of it.

14. 14

    Rolex Learning Center at EPFL - the undulating library

    culture arts

    Out west at the federal technology school, SANAA's single-storey concrete slab rolls up and down over open ground with round holes punched through it, and works as library, cafe and study hall at once. Anyone can walk in, and the m1 light rail drops you at the campus in around fifteen minutes.

15. 15

    Béjart Ballet and the dance scene

    culture arts

    Maurice Béjart moved his company to Lausanne in the 1980s and it still works and performs here, alongside the Prix de Lausanne, the competition that scouts the world's best teenage dancers. Between them and the Théâtre de Vidy on the shore, the city punches well above its size on stage.

Getting to & around Lausanne

Know before you go