Place Kléber
At the centre of Place Kléber stands a 21-metre bronze and stone monument to a man whose ashes are buried in its base and whose heart is in Paris. General Jean-Baptiste Kléber, born in Strasbourg in 1753, died by assassination in Cairo in 1800, and spent nearly two decades in a Marseille fortress before being brought home. Sculptor Philippe Grass finished the statue in 1838; the square took his name two years later.
Today the square is the hinge of central Strasbourg — trams pass its western edge, children splash in the fountains in summer, and in December a 30-metre Christmas tree rises above everything, its lights syncing to music on the hour.
💛 What travellers fall for
People who know the square well tend to pause at the Aubette's pink sandstone facade before going in — the building looks formal from outside, but the second floor holds a free museum around the 1920s interior that Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp created together. Guides call it the Sistine Chapel of abstract art. Most visitors walk straight past it.
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How Place Kléber came to be
The square began as Barfüsserplatz — barefoot square — named for the Franciscan monastery that stood here from the early 13th century. The monastery's cloister fell in 1532, its church a year later, and the space was eventually repurposed as a military parade ground, renamed Waffenplatz in the 17th century.
In 1768, Louis XV's architect Jacques-François Blondel drew plans for a grand ceremonial square. Only one piece was built: the Aubette, completed between 1765 and 1772 as a guardhouse for the Royal Garrison. The Revolution arrived before the rest could be funded. In the 1920s the Aubette's interior was transformed by Arp, Taeuber-Arp and Van Doesburg into something radical; it was stripped out in the 1930s and only restored in 2006. The square's current layout dates to landscape designer Gilles Clément's 2007 restructuring.
Who and what shaped it
People who shaped it
Landmark buildings
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When to go
September and October are the easiest months to spend time here — mild, drier, and the square has room to breathe. December brings the Christkindelsmärik and the great tree, but also genuine cold near freezing and occasional snow. Summer afternoons can turn stormy quickly.
Right now
Background & history adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA) · specs from Wikidata (CC0) · weather from Open-Meteo · map data © OpenStreetMap contributors · photos from Wikimedia Commons / Unsplash with per-image credit. No third-party reviews or social posts reproduced.