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Notre-Dame-du-Mont in Marseille oozes cool, Source: François Schwarz on Flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0)

Marseille is home to this year's coolest neighbourhood in the world

Marseille is home to this year's coolest neighbourhood in the world

Despite its church-y name, the district has long been known as the hangout spot for the artsy crowds

Time Out has published its annual ranking of the coolest neighborhoods in the major cities around the world revealing that the winner for 2024 is Notre-Dame-Du-Mont in the southern French city of Marseille.

Could this mean that Marseille is finally posed to become the new trendy, hip destination on the Mediterranean circuit? The top spot claimed by the neighbourhood certainly points towards that possibility.

Around the metro, new arrivals from Paris and beyond can be found sunning themselves on the terraces along Rue de Lodi, mingling with a diverse crowd of punks and their dogs, women in colourful robes, and salty old sailors sipping 8.6 beer.”

This is how Alicia Dorey, a Time Out writer based in Marseille, describes a typical scene in the neighbourhood.

The creative heart of Marseille

Named after the church of Notre-Dame-du-Mont, which dates back to the middle of the 19th century, the neighbourhood doesn’t exactly strike visitors with an abundance of pious spirit. Instead, it is rather bohemian in orientation, hence the merit of topping a global cool neighbourhood ranking.

You will find it not far from the Old Port, the symbol of Marseille, hidden in the backstreets of the 6th arrondissement. When there, it doesn’t mean you should pass up on the opportunity of visiting the church that gave the name to the neighbourhood. It was inside it that none other than Frederic Chopin who once played the organ as an honour to a friend whose funeral he was attending.

Notre-Dame-du-Mont is cool because it can fulfil all your culinary, cultural and party needs without having to leave its small area.

It’s a great place to stroll along colourful streets adorned with graffiti, such as the Cours Julien staircase, sip a drink on a terrace, shop and enjoy street performances. The pedestrian district around the church, lined up with plane trees (so iconic of the French South), invites the eye and the heart with their offer of interesting characters, bookshops, bars, cafes, tearooms and graffiti.

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