Roman mosaics by the roomful, a medina of tiled courtyards, and a young art scene growing between the lake and the white cliffs of Sidi Bou Saïd.
One of the great collections of Roman mosaics anywhere, floor after floor of them, in a 19th-century beylical palace. Reopened in September 2023 after two years closed; a few rooms are still being renovated.
What the Romans built over the city they destroyed: the Antonine Baths by the sea, Punic ports, and the museum on Byrsa Hill. A UNESCO World Heritage site, scattered through a quiet suburb.
The Kamel Lazaar Foundation's art space (2019), a large white cube with a library and residencies, showing four to six exhibitions a year, and home of the Jaou festival.
Selma Feriani's purpose-built gallery by the lake (2024), and the galleries up in Sidi Bou Saïd, A. Gorgi and Le Violon Bleu among them.
Rooms, ruins and curiosities: the city's other museum.
Baron Rodolphe d'Erlanger's palace (1912–22), built with Tunisian craftsmen in carved plaster, cedar and marble. Now the Centre of Arab and Mediterranean Music, with his collection of instruments.
The burial place of the Husainid beys, from the late 18th century: domed rooms of marble, tiles and carved stucco, almost always empty.
The former Saint-Louis cathedral (1890) on Byrsa Hill, a Byzantine-Moorish fantasy of painted arches, now used for concerts.
The best-preserved Roman town in North Africa, on a hillside of olive groves, about two hours west.
The Romanian aristocrat George Sebastian's 1920s villa and gardens, now an international cultural centre, about an hour south.
The Bardo at opening → lunch in the medina and Tourbet el Bey → the TGM train to Carthage and the Antonine Baths → Sidi Bou Saïd, Ennejma Ezzahra and the galleries at sunset.