Best appreciated from the opposite side of the Danube, the 'Whale', a striking glass structure, was designed by Dutch architect Kas Oosterhuis and built around two existing warehouses on the riverbank. It houses the New Budapest Gallery, hosts events and has a range of shops, restaurants and cafes.
Bálna Budapest
Budapest
Lonely Planet's must-see attractions
1.82 MILES
Castle Hill is a kilometre-long limestone plateau towering 170m above the Danube. It contains some of Budapest’s most important medieval monuments and…
26.53 MILES
The largest church in Hungary sits on Castle Hill, and its 72m-high central dome can be seen for many kilometres around. The building of the present…
0.84 MILES
Budapest's stunning Great Synagogue is the world's largest Jewish house of worship outside New York City. Built in 1859, the synagogue has both Romantic…
4.91 MILES
Home to more than 40 statues, busts and plaques of Lenin, Marx, Béla Kun and others whose likenesses have ended up on trash heaps elsewhere, Memento Park,…
1.23 MILES
Budapest’s neoclassical cathedral is the most sacred Catholic church in all of Hungary and contains its most revered relic: the mummified right hand of…
1.61 MILES
The headquarters of the dreaded ÁVH secret police houses the disturbing House of Terror, focusing on the crimes and atrocities of Hungary's fascist and…
1.77 MILES
The Eclectic-style Parliament, designed by Imre Steindl and completed in 1902, has 691 sumptuously decorated rooms. You’ll get to see several of these and…
0.53 MILES
The Hungarian National Museum houses the nation’s most important collection of historical relics in an impressive neoclassical building, purpose built in…
Nearby Budapest attractions
0.03 MILES
Inside Bálna Budapest, the whale-shaped complex beached by the Danube, the New Budapest Gallery is a spare, modern space hosting changing exhibitions that…
0.34 MILES
Liberty Bridge, with its fin-de-siècle cantilevered span, was opened in time for the Millenary Exhibition in 1896. The bridge was originally named after…
0.38 MILES
Housed in a gorgeous Ödön Lechner–designed building (1896) decorated with Zsolnay ceramic tiles, this museum was closed for renovation at the time of…
0.41 MILES
This chapel is on a small hill directly opposite (north of) the landmark Danubius Hotel Gellért and baths. It was built into a cave in 1926 and was the…
5. Ervin Szabó Central Library
0.43 MILES
Southeast of the Hungarian National Museum is the main repository of Budapest’s public library system, which holds some 2.4 million books and bound…
0.51 MILES
This Baroque church was built in 1742 on the site of an Ottoman mosque. Above the main altar hangs a copy of the Black Madonna of Czetochowa, which is…
0.52 MILES
Boasting a fountain, abstract sculpture, benches and shade sails, ‘University Sq’ takes its name from the branch of the prestigious Loránd Eötvös Science…
0.52 MILES
A restored art deco building, the Corvin sits in the middle of a square flanked by Regency-like houses. Note the two wonderful reliefs outside the main…