Journées Européennes du Patrimoine
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Journées Européennes du Patrimoine
62100 CALAIS
telephone
+33 3 21 46 62 00
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Ask for the program!
Coming soonOn this page, we offer an overview of the program for the European Heritage Days in Calais. All dates, times, and booking information are available in the downloadable program.
Photography Heritage
As the national theme for this 2026 edition, photography finds particularly fertile ground in Calais. One of the names that permeates this history is that of Paul Villy, a Calais-born photographer whose work documented the city from the second half of the 19th century. The weekend offers a rare opportunity to gain a new perspective: the top of the belfry and its gallery of honor are accessible, allowing visitors to capture the city, the coastline, and the surrounding landscapes from a unique angle.
©Nohcab 
©Nohcab
The Municipal Archives present photographs by Maurice Delanghe, an amateur photographer from Calais who captured the city during the Great War and the beginnings of local football, while actor Régis Guigand offers a quirky reflection on photographic memory based on a 1901 photograph of Hussars. The Calaisis Environment and Heritage Association exhibits silver gelatin photographs of post-war reconstruction, the result of a collaboration with Fernand Soupey, heir to the architect Roger Poyé. At the former Félix Cadras school, 255 Calais facades, captured by the camera in 1998, bring this journey through time to a close.
Heritage in danger
Revive, resist, reimagine
The second national theme of this edition, 'heritage in peril', resonates particularly in Calais. Fort RisbanThe exhibition "Calais Port of War" revisits the Pluviôse disaster, a submarine that sank off the coast of the city in 1910, as part of the 400th anniversary of the French Navy.
The latest archaeological excavations in Calais, particularly those at the Richelieu Gate, are documented in images by the Archives Department, while the Calaisis Digital and Innovation Center brings Fort Nieulay back to life as it was in Vauban's time through an immersive 3D application. The Louis Aragon and Fort libraries are also dedicating their weekend events to restored manuscripts from the 14th to the 18th centuries and to the protected species that find refuge in the fortifications.
©Nohcab Cultural heritage
Le Grand Theatre of CalaisA jewel of the Belle Époque with its Italianate architecture, opens its doors for a tour where the walls speak and the actors of the Les Anonymes TP company bring the backstage areas to life. A few steps away, a guided tour retraces the history of the Saint-Pierre district and the Place Crèvecœur, between lace, architecture and urban transformations.
La Dragon Company The park offers a tour of the same neighborhood on the back of a Varan de Voyage (Traveling Varan), with a guide to share the heritage treasures encountered along the way. A technical tour also allows visitors to get closer to the reptile, with its dimensions and technical specifications explained by the pilot-mechanics, while an activity village set up in front of the theater invites young and old to explore the world of machines and urban scenography.
©Fred Collier 
©Timothé Lovergne The Varan in the neighborhoods
Beyond the city centre, the Varan de Voyage also goes to meet the Calais districts during the weekend of the European Heritage Days.
You'll find it in a different neighborhood every weekend starting September 19th. Don't miss the various tours offered and the traveling activity village!
The Traveling Monitor in the Neighborhoods
Museum heritage
Le Museum of Fine Arts dedicates its weekend to dye plants, with a workshop on plant-based inks conducted in collaboration with the Maison de la Nature in Ardres. The company Les Passagers presents a dramatized reading of Burghers of CalaisThe exhibition retraces the commission of Rodin's monument by Mayor Omer Dewavrin in 1884, while Hervé Koubi's junior choreography group performs a piece on the fragility of intangible heritage. A group game, led by the museum's public programs department, invites participants to match music to five works in the museum's collection.
©Charles Delcourt At the City of lace and fashionA virtual reality headset allows visitors to visualize the now-vanished boiler room and the workings of the steam engine that powered the lace-making machines, while the company Holusion presents holograms of iconic Calais buildings and an animated relief map. Isabelle Gruson, a lace-making instructor, offers demonstrations of bobbin and needle lace, and the Mode gallery hosts the exhibition "De Latour & Maïques: Metamorphosis," at the crossroads of art, design, and textile craftsmanship, until December 18th.
©F. Collier 
©Timothé Lovergne Maurizio Galante & Tal Lancman: Haute Couture, Design, Art
Exhibition of national interest
On display until January 3, 2027, the exhibition Maurizio Galante & Tal Lancman: Haute Couture, Design, Art brings together haute couture clothing, furniture, and objects where lace, cabinetmaking, embroidery, and photography intersect. It has received the "Exhibition of National Interest" label awarded by the Ministry of Culture. The detailed program offers tours to help understand the eclectic world of this free-spirited duo.
Discover the exhibition
Maritime heritage
Built in 1848, the Calais lighthouse exceptionally opens its history of lighthouses discovery room and its 271 steps to the summit, with a view extending to the English coast on a clear day. Fort-Vert, the Walde LighthouseListed as a historical monument since 2022 with a wish for further classification, it is photographed and described by Frédéric Lesur, a former merchant marine officer, during a hike to the Oldenburg BatteryThe Regional Federation for Maritime Culture and Heritage completes the picture at the powder magazine of fort Risban with an exhibition on all the lighthouses on the Hauts-de-France coastline.
©Nohcab 
©Nohcab
Along the canals, the association Citizens of Calais for the Climate recounts the history of the drainage ditches and their role in addressing climate change, from pumping stations to walks along the Minck and the Batellerie rivers. The Minck room also hosts the story of Gavet and Mareschal, famous Calais rescuers, while theCalais Aquarium opens its doors to more than 35 pools in Saint-Pierre Park.
Heritage of memory
Lord of Gourdan Street, Notre-Dame church reveals the royal cistern and the Tudor gardens with the Parks and Gardens Department and the Association for the Enhancement of the Architectural Heritage of the Calais region, which is also presenting an exhibition on the Via Francigena, a pilgrimage route linking Canterbury to Rome, with Calais marking its starting point. Another exhibition focuses on the work of Dr. Charlier and on the figure of Lady Hamilton, who died in Calais in 1815.
At Saint-Pierre Park, the Memorial Museum 39-45 presents objects from daily life under the Occupation, while in front of the Saint-Pierre church, the organist François Lombard demonstrates the workings of the grand organ inaugurated in 1870. At the former Félix Cadras school, the association Les Amis du Vieux Calais provides free access to the local Calais press since the beginning of the 20th century and offers an introduction to genealogy.
©Nohcab 
©Timothé Lovergne Ask for the program!
Coming soonOn this page, we offer an overview of the program for the European Heritage Days in Calais. All dates, times, and booking information are available in the downloadable program.