Belgium · Flanders
Where to Stay in Kortrijk, Flanders
Kortrijk, known in English as Courtrai, is the West Flanders city of the Broel Towers, the belfry and the béguinage of Courtrai.
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Where to stay in Kortrijk
Each area has its own feel; here's who each one suits.
The Broel Towers set the reference point. Beds in Kortrijk gather around the old core, where the Belfry of Kortrijk, Sint-Maartenskerk and the Broelmuseum stand close enough together that one walk takes in all three. That core is compact.
You should take it when the museums are the reason for the trip, since the béguinage of Courtrai and the Gravenkapel sit inside the same few streets and the Groeninge Monument is not far off. Sint-Janskerk and Sint-Michielskerk add two more names to a list of churches that runs long for a city of this size. Outside that ring the municipality spreads.
Heule, Marke and Bissegem are three of the towns it takes in, and Aalbeke, Bellegem, Kooigem and Rollegem make up the rest, which is a great deal of ground for one city name to cover. Few beds sit out among those towns. Sportcampus Lange Munte pulls its own traffic away from the museums, while Het Baggaertshof and the Artillerietoren give the quieter edges of the centre something worth the walk, and Sint-Amandstoren marks a third corner of it.
Kortrijk is the capital of its arrondissement, so the beds that exist are concentrated where the offices and the shops already are.
About Kortrijk
Flax has a national museum here.
What is Kortrijk known for?
The Nationaal Vlasmuseum and Texture both belong to Kortrijk, and the Broelmuseum adds the art collection, so three museums sit inside a city that also keeps the Curiosamuseum. Stone carries the rest. The Belfry of Kortrijk, the Broel Towers and the béguinage of Courtrai are the names most visitors come for, with the Groeninge Monument standing apart from them as a commemorative marker.
What are the main landmarks in Kortrijk?
Towers do most of the work. The Belfry of Kortrijk and the Broel Towers are the two the city is recognised by, and the Artillerietoren and Sint-Amandstoren add a third and fourth. Parish churches carry the rest.
Sint-Maartenskerk, the Church of Our Lady and the Gravenkapel head that list, and Sint-Pauluskerk, Sint-Rochuskerk, Sint-Elisabethkerk and Sint-Brixiuskerk carry it further. The béguinage of Courtrai is the quietest of them.
What is the history of Kortrijk?
A second name shadows Kortrijk. Kortrijk is the Flemish form and Courtrai the one that reached English, occasionally written Courtray, and the béguinage of Courtrai still carries that second name in its own title. Defence left clear marks.
The Broel Towers, the Artillerietoren and Sint-Amandstoren are the towers the city kept, and the Belfry of Kortrijk is the civic member of that group rather than a military one. Flax has its own museum. The Nationaal Vlasmuseum names that trade outright, and the Broelmuseum, Texture and the Curiosamuseum fill out a museum list that runs long for a city this size.
The municipality is larger than the city. Aalbeke, Bellegem, Bissegem, Heule, Kooigem, Marke and Rollegem are all part of it, which is why the arrondissement of Kortrijk and the city of Kortrijk mean different things on a map. Sint-Janskerk, Sint-Michielskerk, Sint-Antoniuskerk and Sint-Ritakerk carry the parish record outward, and the Groeninge Monument was raised as a commemoration rather than a place of worship.
Where is Kortrijk?
The municipality covers 80 square kilometres. Kortrijk proper takes only part of that, with Aalbeke, Bellegem, Bissegem, Heule, Kooigem, Marke and Rollegem accounting for the rest of the ground the city name covers. West Flanders is the province.
The arrondissement of Kortrijk takes its name from the city at its centre, and Flanders is the region above both, which leaves three administrative layers between a Kortrijk street and Belgium.
What is the climate of Kortrijk?
Temperate is what Flanders gives. Kortrijk sits in the temperate band of the northern hemisphere, which keeps the extremes off the city and leaves each season to shade into the next rather than break against it. The outer towns share it.
Heule, Kooigem, Rollegem and the rest of the municipality lie close enough to the centre that a day's weather in one is a day's weather in all of them, which is not true of every city this wide.
How do you get to Kortrijk?
Arrivals converge on the belfry. Kortrijk is the capital of its arrondissement, which makes the centre the point the rest of West Flanders around it is measured from, and the way in ends among the same few streets. Seven towns ring it.
Aalbeke, Bellegem, Bissegem, Heule, Kooigem, Marke and Rollegem all belong to the municipality, so a visitor arriving by road crosses at least one of them before the Broel Towers come into view.
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Updated August 2026