The City Of Metz

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Metz

St Etienne Cathedral

With it's twenty miles of landscaped walks along rivers, canals and ramparts, Metz is known as the green garden city, and won the first European prize for flowered cities. Many of the building are built using the yellow ochre Jaumont stone. This gives the buildings a softness typical of the mediterranean towns in the south.

Metz is built on several islands which were formed by the Moselle and Seille which makes water one of the towns main natural features and adds to it's beauty and charm.

Metz was a very important Roman city and was the capital of the kingdom of Austrasia. It was also an opulent medieval city and through the centuries Metz has accumulated a priceless historical and cultural inheritance. Metz is also the modern capital of Lorraine and has more than 20 bridges that criss-cross the river and canals of the Moselle and Seille.

Probably it's most famous landmark is the stunning and very impressive Gothic cathredal of Saint Stephen where tourists from all over the word come to visit. Built between the years 1220 and 1520 the imposing silhouette of Saint Stephen cathedral dominates the city. With more than 6,500 m2 surface of windows, it is the most luminous cathedral in France! It is truly a masterpiece of the Gothic design.

The Musée de la Cour d’Or (also known as the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire) on Rue de la Cour d’Or is set in a deconsecrated monastery. It displays various treasures such as painted gothic wooden ceilings (13th century) and the Chancel of Saint-Pierre-aux-Nonnains - a stone balustrade which is considered to be one of the most important stone-works of the early Middle-Ages in France. It is also the site of the now famous Gallo-Roman thermal baths which were only discovered by accident during building work in the 1930s.

Another building to be sure to visit is the Saint-Pierre-aux-Nonnains church of which the construction dates back to the 4th century. In the 7th century, it became the church of the abbey founded by a Saint Waldrée. Re-furbished during the 10th and the 15th centuries, this building now belongs to the arts centre of the Arsenal.

The Templar's Chapel was built between 1180 to 1220 and is the only remaining vestige of the Templar's Commandery. The octagonal shape of this building is unique to the region.

If you wish to explore a little outside Metz, the countryside is rich in history - the roman aqueduc in Jouy-aux-Arches, the church of Sillegny where you can see incredible wall-paintings from the 16th century, or perhaps visit Gorze where you'll find the site of a Benedictine abbey where the Gregorian chant originated.

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