Fondation Luma

Arles


Arles' already-bulging cultural landscape avidly awaits this new cutting-edge gallery and arts centre, rising inexorably at a defunct railway depot in the city's southeastern quarter. Funded by the Swiss-based Luma Foundation, and designed by Frank Gehry, it's set for a high-profile opening in 2019. If you want a scoop, there are French-language guided visits of the site five times a week, and one in English at 11.30am on Saturdays (adult/child €7/free).


Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby Arles attractions

1. Les Alyscamps

0.19 MILES

Testament to the significance of Roman Arles, this grand processional avenue of tombs and sarcophagi holds more than 1500 years of corpses (which Roman…

2. Église Notre Dame de la Major

0.3 MILES

Complicated restoration projects mean this 12th-century church, dominating Arles from the highest point in the city, can only be admired from outside…

3. Les Arènes

0.37 MILES

In Roman Gaul, every important town had an amphitheatre, where gladiators and wild animals met their (usually grisly) ends. Few examples have survived,…

4. Théâtre Antique

0.41 MILES

It's easy to admire the grace and engineering of this theatre – built at the behest of the unofficial first Roman Emperor, Augustus, in the 1st century BC…

5. Église St-Trophime

0.46 MILES

Named for Arles' semi-mythical first archbishop, this Romanesque-style church, built over a 5th-century basilica, was a cathedral until the bishopric…

6. Hôtel de Ville

0.48 MILES

Completed in 1676, and still the seat of Arles' government, the handsome Town Hall is also the entrance to the subterranean Roman Cryptoportiques.

7. Cryptoportiques

0.49 MILES

The origins of these fascinating underground chambers, now sitting below the current city centre, go at least back to the first Roman colony in Arles in…

8. Place du Forum

0.53 MILES

Just as social, political and religious life revolved around the forum in Roman Arles, so the busy plane-tree-shaded place du Forum still buzzes with life…