Describing my city is rather an impossible task. Antwerp has so many aspects that mentioning a few of them would do injustice to all the others. So, the only thing we can say is: come and experience the breath of the city that is one of the biggest ports in the world; the world capital of diamonds; the home town of Rubens, Van Dyck and many other world-famous painters, the city of Plantijn, who made printing an art. A place housing more than hundred nationalities, with the highest concentration of polyglots in the world, with the countless restaurants, pubs, beers, discos and cafe terraces, with its medieval heart, its rich cultural heritage. A place where doing business is always combined with the finest gastronomy and wit.
A proud and free city but tolerant, cosmopolitan and a little bit exotic and whose inhabitants (the "Sinjoren", from the Spanish senores) know better than any other people what Burgundian lifestyle really means. Antwerp is a melting pot of cultures, a hospitable and safe haven. Over the centuries the City-on-the-Scheldt has turned the ’sinjoren’ into cosmopolitans. This is wonderful if you are a visitor. You will always meet with a friendly reception and, if at all possible, in your own language.
Antwerp is a metropolis and yet small-scale. That is undoubtedly one of its charms. So put on your walking shoes and start exploring. This town on the Scheldt is a real metropolis which welcomes merchants, businessmen, artists and travelers from all over the world. Spaniards, Jews, Greeks, Turks, Russians, Dutchmen, Germans, Chinese, Indians and Americans, to name but a few, are represented among the more than 135 nationalities which are at home in this world city. They have their own clubs, centers, and religious institutions, which go towards making Antwerp into a cosmopolitan region of which the appearance and way of life have rightly been described as the most southern in Northern Europe. Attracted because every encouragement was given to foreigners, thinkers, dreamers, builders and the active have settled here.
A port of world stature, a history of unusual freedom, a treasure chest of art, architecture, learning and music, Antwerp lends itself to exploration. With the exception of Brussels, Antwerp, with its half million inhabitants is the largest city in Belgium and is, moreover, at the center of a metropolitan area of 1,150,000 inhabitants. Nevertheless Antwerp is intimate: a web of squares and winding streets, of shops and art galleries, of churches and statues, warehouses and wharves, it presents corners to be turned, alleys to be penetrated and the bustle of resilient, confident townspeople to be enjoyed.
The Jugendstil area around the Cogels-Osylei is world famous. And in recent years, daring examples of modern architecture have appeared here and there.
