TOP 24 best attractions in Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv is the busiest city in Israel, where par­ty life with beach­es and clubs takes place against the back­drop of ancient archi­tec­tur­al mon­u­ments. That is why this city is so pop­u­lar with tourists of all ages.

Things to do in Tel Aviv

Those who want to enjoy archi­tec­ture should take a walk through the White City, built accord­ing to the prin­ci­ples of the Bauhaus design trend. The view from the obser­va­tion deck of the Azrieli sky­scraper com­plex is also impres­sive.

Muse­ums will be of inter­est to peo­ple who are con­stant­ly expand­ing their hori­zons. Eretz Israel is the coun­try’s cul­tur­al trea­sure trove with impor­tant archae­o­log­i­cal finds. The Muse­um of Fine Arts hous­es works by Israeli artists, as well as can­vas­es by world-famous mas­ters.

Tel Aviv’s parks invite you to enjoy nature, and the his­tor­i­cal dis­tricts invite you to take a trip into the past.

Architecture

Azrieli Center

The archi­tec­tur­al ensem­ble of three sky­scrap­ers was built from 1996 to 2007 with the finan­cial sup­port of Cana­di­an busi­ness­man D. Azrieli. The tallest build­ing of the com­plex is a round tow­er (187 m), the facade of which is dec­o­rat­ed with more than 8 thou­sand win­dows. There is an obser­va­tion deck on the 49th floor, and a restau­rant on the top floor.

The square tow­er rush­es up to 154 m, the tri­an­gu­lar one — to 169 m. The sky­scrap­ers are con­nect­ed by a shop­ping cen­ter at the base.

White City

Sev­er­al large areas in the cen­ter of Tel Aviv are lined with pre­dom­i­nant­ly white Bauhaus hous­es. This style, which pro­motes sim­plic­i­ty and func­tion­al­i­ty, orig­i­nat­ed in Ger­many at the begin­ning of the 20th cen­tu­ry. When the Jews began to be per­se­cut­ed by the Nazis, they moved to Pales­tine. Among the set­tlers were archi­tects who stud­ied at the pop­u­lar Bauhaus design school — they then began large-scale devel­op­ment of land pur­chased from Mus­lims.

The largest num­ber of build­ings (about 4 thou­sand) appeared in the peri­od 1930–1950. One of the most inter­est­ing build­ings is a house designed by Zeev Rechter in 1933. The struc­ture rests on pil­lars and is cooled by the sea breeze. Below it in the shade is a play­ground.

The cen­ter of the White City is Roth­schild Boule­vard, a favorite place for city dwellers to walk. There are cafes, bars, restau­rants and shops. The Bauhaus cen­ter set­tled on Dizen­goff Street, where the epony­mous muse­um and exhi­bi­tion gallery are locat­ed.

pagoda house

The house got its name because of the styl­ized roof typ­i­cal of an Asian tem­ple. This is the first detail that catch­es the eye. If you look close­ly, you can eas­i­ly notice oth­er archi­tec­tur­al styles, the col­li­sion of which cre­ates a unique visu­al effect.

Facade arch­es refer to the ear­ly Chris­t­ian basil­i­cas, the columns are neo­clas­si­cal, the open pavil­ion is the embod­i­ment of ori­en­tal lux­u­ry. The decor is a fusion of Art Nou­veau, Goth­ic and Bud­dhism. The house was built in 1925 accord­ing to the project of A. Levy for a wealthy emi­grant from the USA, where such archi­tec­tur­al eclec­ti­cism was at the height of fash­ion at that time.

jaffa clock tower

The erec­tion of a tow­er of rough stone was timed to coin­cide with the next anniver­sary of the reign of Caliph Abdul-Hamid II, the last sul­tan of the Ottoman Empire. Con­struc­tion began at the begin­ning of the 20th cen­tu­ry on the ter­ri­to­ry of Jaf­fa — today it is the old­est dis­trict of Tel Aviv. The tow­er was the first civ­il build­ing with a clock; before that, dials were placed only on minarets.

Historical monuments

Ancient city of Antipatris

Around 35 BC. King Herod the Great found­ed a set­tle­ment, which he named after his father Antipa­ter. Accord­ing to the Old Tes­ta­ment, Jesus Christ and the Apos­tle Paul vis­it­ed this city. Antipa­tris is locat­ed 15 km from Tel Aviv and is part of the Tel Afek Park.

The main street of Car­do, which cross­es Antipa­tris strict­ly from north to south, as well as the fortress, has been well pre­served to this day. The for­ti­fi­ca­tion build­ing acquired a fin­ished appear­ance by the 16th cen­tu­ry dur­ing the reign of the Turks. The citadel has the shape of a square with four tow­ers on the sides.

Caesarea National Park

The reserve is locat­ed on the ter­ri­to­ry of the ancient city, most of which was swal­lowed up by the Mediter­ranean Sea. Tourists are offered to see the embank­ment and the pre­served build­ings, includ­ing: the amphithe­ater, the palace of Herod the Great, the aque­duct, the hip­po­drome, Byzan­tine baths, as well as the “Street of stat­ues”.

You should def­i­nite­ly vis­it the arche­o­log­i­cal exhi­bi­tions and take a vir­tu­al jour­ney – on the big screen, with the help of graph­ics, they recre­at­ed the appear­ance of the ancient city and revived its his­to­ry. There are cafes, gal­leries, shops and sou­venir shops on the ter­ri­to­ry of the park.

Museums

Diaspora Museum

The muse­um was estab­lished in hon­or of the 30th anniver­sary of the found­ing of the State of Israel. Arti­facts were col­lect­ed lit­er­al­ly bit by bit all over the world. Here you can learn about the pecu­liar­i­ties of the way of life of the Jew­ish dias­po­ra in dif­fer­ent coun­tries.

In 2017, the muse­um was replen­ished with new col­lec­tions that reflect the changes in the men­tal­i­ty and cul­ture of the Jew­ish peo­ple from bib­li­cal times to the present day.

Design Museum

The muse­um, opened in 2010, is locat­ed in Holon, a satel­lite of Tel Aviv. An unusu­al build­ing for orig­i­nal works of art was built by archi­tect Ron Arad. The design con­sists of five mul­ti-col­ored rib­bons wrapped around a struc­ture made of glass and con­crete. Two of them are used as gal­leries and are con­nect­ed by a pedes­tri­an bridge.

The exhi­bi­tion is divid­ed into 4 sec­tions:

• his­tor­i­cal projects,
• mod­ern design,
• the best the­ses of stu­dents of the Acad­e­my of Design,
• art objects cre­at­ed by order of the muse­um.

The col­lec­tions include fur­ni­ture and house­hold items, jew­el­ry, tex­tiles, shoes and decor.

Eretz Israel

The Archae­o­log­i­cal and His­tor­i­cal Muse­um was opened in 1953. The expo­si­tions are locat­ed both in the pavil­ions and in the open air. Here are ancient arti­facts found in Israel dur­ing exca­va­tions. These are ceram­ics, jew­el­ry, weapons, rit­u­al objects, mosaics, frag­ments of palaces, tem­ples and much more. The muse­um hous­es an exten­sive col­lec­tion of his­tor­i­cal books, man­u­scripts and doc­u­ments of great cul­tur­al val­ue.

Art Museum

The muse­um was found­ed in 1932 and was orig­i­nal­ly locat­ed in the House of Dizen­goff (the first may­or of Tel Aviv). Today, the gallery occu­pies a com­plex of build­ings where you can get acquaint­ed with the cre­ations of Israeli sculp­tors and artists, as well as enjoy the mas­ter­pieces of Mon­et, Modigliani, Renoir, Sis­ley, Matisse, Picas­so, Pol­lock and oth­er mas­ters.

Today it is the largest muse­um in Israel, dis­play­ing both clas­si­cal and con­tem­po­rary works of art.

Ilana Gur Museum

Ilana Gur is an artist and a very extra­or­di­nary per­son. There is a lot of con­tro­ver­sy about her tal­ent. Some say that she is a genius, oth­ers call her a mediocre pos­er. To form your own opin­ion, you need to vis­it the muse­um and part-time house where Ilana lives when she comes to Tel Aviv from New York.

The muse­um is locat­ed in the old quar­ter of Jaf­fa, in a for­mer hotel for pil­grims. The expo­si­tion presents con­cep­tu­al paint­ings, pho­tographs, sculp­tures and intri­cate instal­la­tions made of var­i­ous mate­ri­als, main­ly met­al.

The most vis­it­ed place in the house is the monks’ room with the Morn­ing After art object. On a mas­sive long table, a lot of objects are scat­tered, fig­urines of birds, ani­mal heads, frag­ments of plants. 12 heavy chairs are pulled up to the table. Per­haps this is a ref­er­ence to The Last Sup­per, how­ev­er, every­one is free to inter­pret the com­po­si­tion in their own way.

Theaters

Habima

The old­est the­ater in Israel was found­ed in Vil­na in 1917, and 11 years lat­er it moved to Pales­tine. The founder of the the­ater, Naum Tse­makh, staged per­for­mances exclu­sive­ly in Hebrew, so when choos­ing the first actors, he relied not on their tal­ent, but on knowl­edge of the lan­guage.

The name of the the­ater is trans­lat­ed as “depart­ment” or “stage”. Today, there are plays by Israeli and for­eign play­wrights, includ­ing Russ­ian ones, all in Hebrew.

Gesher

The the­ater was found­ed in 1991 by repa­tri­ates from Moscow. He did not have his own build­ing, so the troupe was shel­tered in the Habi­ma The­ater. The per­for­mances were per­formed simul­ta­ne­ous­ly in Russ­ian and Hebrew, which con­tributed to the tremen­dous suc­cess.

The the­ater moved to its own “house” two years lat­er, and a lit­tle lat­er the actors received a new build­ing near the flea mar­ket in Jaf­fa. The reper­toire includes clas­si­cal and mod­ern pro­duc­tions. Per­for­mances are in Hebrew with Russ­ian sub­ti­tles.

Religious sites

St. Peter’s Church

A baroque pink brick Catholic church is locat­ed in Jaf­fa. It was built in 1654 on the foun­da­tions of a 13th cen­tu­ry fortress. The tem­ple was destroyed and rebuilt sev­er­al times, each time acquir­ing new fea­tures. The cur­rent ver­sion of the build­ing dates back to the 19th cen­tu­ry. The inside of the church is dec­o­rat­ed with stained-glass win­dows, vault­ed ceil­ings and a carved wood­en pul­pit.

The con­struc­tion of the church is asso­ci­at­ed with a bib­li­cal event. It is believed that the Apos­tle Paul came to these places, who mirac­u­lous­ly raised a vir­tu­ous Chris­t­ian woman from the dead.

Great synagogue

The Allen­by Street Syn­a­gogue bears lit­tle resem­blance to a non-reli­gious build­ing. The first tra­di­tion­al build­ing with a dome and arch­es was built in 1925 with mon­ey from Roth­schild. In the 1930s, Ze’ev Rechter, an adher­ent of the Bauhaus style, redesigned the façade accord­ing to his vision, paint­ing it white and adding stairs.

In the 1970s, a for­est of con­crete columns grew along the perime­ter — a trib­ute to the fash­ion of those years. But the main high­light of the build­ing is the stained-glass win­dows. These are copies of the stained glass win­dows of syn­a­gogues destroyed dur­ing the Holo­caust in Europe.

parks

Yarkon

The largest park in Tel Aviv, found­ed in 1973, is called the “lungs” of the city. It is locat­ed along the Yarkon Riv­er, which gave it its name. The green ter­ri­to­ry is divid­ed into 6 the­mat­ic zones, among which there is a gar­den of stones, cac­ti and a trop­i­cal cor­ner.

The park has trails for walk­ing and cycling. There are foot­ball, base­ball and ten­nis courts for lovers of active sports. Swans, ducks, herons, por­cu­pines, nutrias, mon­goos­es and oth­er wildlife live in the recre­ation­al area near the water.

Charles Clore Park

The park at the very edge of the sea is named after the financier and phil­an­thropist Charles Clore. Dur­ing the War of Inde­pen­dence, this urban area was heav­i­ly dam­aged. Over time, the inhab­i­tants were relo­cat­ed, and a recre­ation­al zone was cre­at­ed on the site of the slums.

Imple­ment­ing the project, land­scape design­ers faced a seri­ous prob­lem — the soil com­po­si­tion did not allow plant­i­ng trees here. It was decid­ed to cre­ate a ter­ri­to­ry for enjoy­ing the sea views, the set­ting sun and the salty wind. So, sheds appeared on the ter­ri­to­ry of the park to pro­tect vis­i­tors from the scorch­ing sun, foun­tains, bar­be­cue areas, chil­dren’s and sports grounds.

Interesting places

Old Jaffa

Jaf­fa is the old­est city in the world, which today has become a pic­turesque quar­ter of Tel Aviv. It is believed that the first set­tle­ment appeared in the time of the Egypt­ian pharaohs. Turks, Arabs, ancient Romans and cru­saders left their mark here. Majes­tic ruins adorn the ter­ri­to­ry stretch­ing along the sea.

In the mid-1990s, the area was restored. Fash­ion­able restau­rants, cafes, gal­leries, sou­venir shops, shops and the­aters appeared here. Old Jaf­fa is home to icon­ic land­marks such as Kudu­mi Square with St. Peter’s Church, Al-Bahr Mosque and the Clock Tow­er.

old port

The sea har­bor reg­u­lar­ly received car­go and pas­sen­ger ships from 1938 to 1965, and then trans­ferred its func­tions to a new suc­ces­sor. In the mid-90s, the aban­doned port was ren­o­vat­ed and turned into a tourist attrac­tion with a prom­e­nade, restau­rants, shops and open-air sou­venir mar­kets.

Neve Tzedek

The his­tor­i­cal quar­ter was built up at the turn of the 19th-20th cen­turies accord­ing to the Euro­pean mod­el. Repa­tri­ates from Poland, Ger­many, the Czech Repub­lic, Roma­nia and Italy set­tled in stone hous­es with ter­ra­cot­ta roofs. They bought land from the Mus­lims and became the first Jew­ish set­tlers out­side of Jaf­fa. The area has retained the charm of ancient archi­tec­ture. After walk­ing through the qui­et streets, you can look into one of the cof­fee hous­es that Neve Tzedek is famous for.

Taelet

Taelet (or embank­ment) stretch­es along the edge of the sea for sev­er­al kilo­me­ters. There is always life and some­thing going on here. Restau­rants invite you to taste deli­cious dish­es, clubs invite you to attend loud par­ties, bars invite you to enjoy cock­tails. Shops and bou­tiques are open sev­en days a week.

Cyclists and roller skaters scur­ry along the paths, there are always a lot of moth­ers with chil­dren on the play­grounds. Along the water­front are pop­u­lar hotels that over­look 16 well-main­tained beach­es.

Sarona Market

The most col­or­ful mar­ket in the city, sell­ing fruits, veg­eta­bles, nuts, spices, tea, meat and the fresh­est seafood. Sep­a­rate­ly, there are small shops with dairy prod­ucts. All select­ed qual­i­ty and, of course, kosher. There are cafes and restau­rants on the ter­ri­to­ry of the bazaar. The bazaar is cov­ered, so a walk, even on a hot day, will not be tir­ing.

Carmel Market

The old­est mar­ket in Tel Aviv has been known since 1920. It is believed that it was found­ed by Russ­ian emi­grants who left in search of a bet­ter life after the Octo­ber Rev­o­lu­tion. Near their homes, they set up stalls from which they trad­ed food and house­hold uten­sils. Over time, the mar­ket has grown to an incred­i­ble size. Prices here are low­er than in stores.

Swap meet

The flea mar­ket in Old Jaf­fa is anoth­er tourist attrac­tion. Here, mixed with old things, they sell antiques, paint­ings and out­landish giz­mos from all over the world. This place was cho­sen by design­ers and artists who offer author’s cre­ations. Trade is appro­pri­ate.