The architectural heritage and a popular art of Poland are sources of pride of the Polish people. All the great European architectural styles are found in the Polish cities and their castles, churches and palaces: Roman, Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Classicism. In the countryside, medieval castles and manors strew the landscape. The small medieval city of Kazimierz on the Vistula and the Gothic monuments of Cracow constitute real open museums.

The oldest masonries, princely palates and vault-rotundas, date from the Xth century. In the XIIIrd century, the monuments of the Roman art were supplanted by Gothic buildings. The style of the ribbed vault inspired the Polish artists; it generated many architectural work like Notre-Dame of Cracow, the wooden triptych of polychrome of Veit Stoss (Wit Stwosz).

Many buildings had to be restored or rebuilt, often in a way identical at the origin, like the old city and the Royal Castle of Warsaw, and the old cities of Gdansk and Wroclaw. A number of Polish cities were indeed heavily bombarded during the Second World war and in particular Warsaw, destroyed to 90 %.

The country counts a number of skansens and museums in the open air, where the country life is formerly restored. Painting, sculpture, woodcarving, weaving, embroidery, cuttings of paper and pottery constitute the principal representations of the popular art, of which most known woodcarvings from the XIVth century of Wit Stwosz in Notre-Dame in Cracow.