Give St. Gallen two days. Day one is the Abbey District: the library hall in the morning before the groups, the cathedral, then the old town lanes for the oriel windows and a bratwurst on the street. Day two is the Textile Museum, the red Stadtlounge, and the Mühleggbahn up to the Drei Weieren ponds for the view. Add a third day for Appenzell or the Säntis.
Updated · Wimup Editorial
St. Gallen is the capital of its canton and the main city of eastern Switzerland, an hour by train from Zurich. A monastery founded on the site of the hermit Gallus's cell made it, embroidery made it rich, and both left their mark on an old town small enough to walk in a morning.
The rococo hall of one of the oldest monastic libraries in the world, built between 1758 and 1767 and holding about 160,000 volumes. Visitors wear felt slippers over the parquet, and cases show medieval manuscripts in rotation.
One of the last great baroque churches built in Europe, raised between 1755 and 1767. The green and gold of the rotunda and the carved choir stalls are the reason to sit for ten minutes.
St. Gallen's merchants hung carved and painted oriels, called Erker, off their houses in the 17th and 18th centuries, and about 111 survive. Spisergasse, Gallusstrasse and Marktgasse carry the best of them within ten minutes of each other.
Linen and then machine embroidery made St. Gallen one of the richest cities in Europe before 1914, and this museum shows how. Expect historic lace and embroidery, pattern books and changing exhibitions.
A short funicular, open since 1893 and now a self-service inclined lift, climbs from the edge of the Abbey District to St. Georgen. From the top it is a short walk to the three ponds the textile trade once used, and to the best view of the city.
Pipilotti Rist and Carlos Martinez covered a block of the Bleicheli banking quarter in red granulate in 2005, furniture, a fountain and a car included. Locals call it the Roter Platz. Go after dark, when the lamps hung over it come on.
The white veal and pork St. Galler Bratwurst goes back to a butchers' guild rule of 1438 and holds a protected origin label. It comes grilled with a bürli roll and no mustard, which locals hold is an insult to the sausage.
Switzerland's largest surviving locomotive roundhouse, built between 1903 and 1911 beside the station, now holds theatre, dance, a cinema, the Kunstmuseum's contemporary art space and Restaurant LOK.
A free wildlife park on the hill at Rotmonten, about 780 m up, with ibex on their rocks, chamois, lynx, wild boar and marmots. On a clear day the paths look out over Lake Constance to the Alpstein.
The city's art museum, in a 19th-century building in the Stadtpark, mixes a collection of Swiss and European painting with strong temporary shows of modern and contemporary art. The Naturmuseum is a few minutes away.
The city's history collection, renamed from the Historical and Ethnographic Museum.
A first-floor tavern in the last guildhall of its kind in the city, over 500 years old.
In a house from 1552; order the bratwurst grilled on lava stone with rösti.
Carnival week: brass bands, masks and parades through the old town.
The eastern Swiss spring fair in the Olma halls.
Switzerland's official show-jumping nations event at the Gründenmoos stadium.
Four days of rock and pop in the Sitter valley; 25 to 28 June in 2026.
Opera and theatre, staged outdoors on the abbey square every other year.
Fireworks and bonfires across the canton on 1 August.
Eleven days of farming, food and bratwurst; 8 to 18 October in 2026.
Hundreds of stars over the old town and a market on Gallusplatz.
The main airport for St. Gallen. Direct trains run twice an hour and take about an hour.
St. Gallen station is ten minutes' walk from the abbey, with fast trains to Zurich and Lake Constance.
Regional trains from St. Gallen into the Appenzell hills, including the line to Appenzell itself.
Buses fan out from the station and Bohl. The Mühleggbahn to St. Georgen is part of the city network.
The larger 160 g version sold at the autumn fair.
Crisp fried grated potato, the tavern side for sausage or liver.
The spicy brine-washed hard cheese from the hills next door.
White veal and pork, grilled, with a roll and no mustard.
Honey-spice cake filled with almond paste, pressed with a motif.
The crusty double roll served with the bratwurst.
Calf's liver with rösti, a staple of the first-floor taverns.
Brewed in St. Gallen since 1779, the oldest brewery in Switzerland.
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