Rue du Tresor - The Artists' Alley

Photo: Jeangagnon, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)

A stop on Old Quebec City Walking Tour, a free self-guided tour.

This narrow pedestrian lane is hung with paintings, prints and watercolours, most of them made by the artists standing beside them. It's one of the best places in town to buy an original picture of Quebec rather than a souvenir copy.

The name means Treasury Street. In the days of New France, colonists came this way to pay their dues and do business at the royal treasury office nearby, so the lane quite literally led to the king's money.

The art came much later. In the 1960s a couple of local artists began hanging their work on these walls, and others soon followed as visitors stopped to browse. An artists' association now manages the stalls, and the busiest season runs through the warmer months, with fewer painters out in winter.

Take your time and chat with the artists; many are happy to talk about where they set up their easels in the old city.

Getting here: Cross Place d'Armes beside the Chateau to its far corner, where the narrow lane of Rue du Tresor heads north from Rue Sainte-Anne.

Did you know?: The city frowned on the artists when they first moved into the lane in the 1960s, but the open-air gallery became one of Old Quebec's best-known sights.

Photo op: From the Rue Sainte-Anne end, shoot up the lane so the rows of paintings lead your eye toward the basilica at the far end.

More on Wikipedia: Place d'Armes · New France

Rue du Tresor - The Artists' Alley

Stops on this tour