Hotels near Old Town (Altstadt) with Painted Facades and Frescoed Squares

Lucerne's Old Town (Altstadt) occupies the right bank of the Reuss and is small enough to cover in a single unhurried afternoon. The three squares to focus on are Weinmarkt, Hirschenplatz and Kornmarkt, each ringed by 15th- and 16th-century townhouses whose facades are painted with historical, biblical and guild scenes. The Hotel des Balances on Weinmarkt carries some of the best-preserved frescoes. The Old Town Hall (Altes Rathaus) on Kornmarkt was built between 1602 and 1606 in a hybrid Italian Renaissance-Swiss chalet style, and its ground-floor arcades still host a produce market on Tuesday and Saturday mornings, 06:00-13:00.

Most streets are cobblestone and pedestrian-only, so a walking tour on your own works well. The city runs a two-hour English-language guided Old Town walk from the tourist office at the Bahnhof for CHF 25 in 2026, departing Wednesday and Saturday at 09:45.

Pro Tip: Do the Old Town on a Tuesday or Saturday morning to catch the twice-weekly market under the Rathaus arcades - alpine cheese, fresh bread and Luzerner Chügelipastete (a savoury vol-au-vent) are the local buys. Keep your camera on the upper storeys of the facades; the ground floors are mostly shopfronts and dilute the frescoes.