Mulhouse Christmas Market 2026: Dates, Hours and the Étoffe de Noël

The Mulhouse Christmas market runs from Friday 20 November to Sunday 27 December 2026 on Place de la Réunion, around the Temple Saint-Étienne, and on Place des Cordiers. The stalls open Monday to Thursday from 11:00 to 20:00 and Friday to Sunday from 10:00 to 21:00. The market is closed on 25 December, opens at 12:00 on 26 December, and closes at 18:00 on 24 and 27 December. Entry is free.

Quick facts (dates checked November 2026)

• Dates: 20 November to 27 December 2026. The market on Place de la Concorde stays open until 29 December.
• Hours: Monday–Thursday 11:00–20:00; Friday–Sunday 10:00–21:00. Closed 25 December; 26 December from 12:00; 24 and 27 December until 18:00.
• Where: Place de la Réunion and the streets around the Temple Saint-Étienne, plus Place des Cordiers, in the old centre of Mulhouse.
• This year's fabric: "Jardin d'hiver" (Winter Garden), the Étoffe de Noël 2026.
• Getting there: about 40 TGV trains a day; Paris is 2 hours 40 minutes away. Park-and-ride costs €2 a day including a return tram ticket for everyone in the car.

Mulhouse, in southern Alsace, made its fortune in the 18th and 19th centuries printing cotton. Its Christmas market is smaller than Strasbourg's and Colmar's, and it has one feature neither of them has: every year the city commissions a new Christmas fabric, the Étoffe de Noël, and hangs it across the streets, the chalets and the town hall. The market itself has about 90 chalets, according to the tourist office, and most of the sellers are local. It suits visitors who want an Alsace Christmas market without the crowds of the wine-route towns, people interested in textiles and design, and anyone already heading to Basel or Freiburg, both close by.

The Étoffe de Noël: Jardin d'hiver, 2026

The city has created a new Christmas fabric every year since 1998, according to its 2024 press kit. Each design is printed in large quantities (10,000 metres in 2024) and used to dress the town: drapes on the Hôtel de Ville, panels on the chalets, decorations in shop windows. The idea comes from Mulhouse's history as a centre of printed cotton. The first factory printing "indiennes", the patterned cottons that made the town rich, opened in 1746, and by the late 19th century Mulhouse was one of the textile capitals of Europe.

The 2026 fabric is called "Jardin d'hiver" (Winter Garden). The organisers describe it as flowers, foliage and berries set within a geometric structure, in Christmas colours, drawn from Art nouveau motifs in the collections of the Musée de l'Impression sur Étoffes. It was designed by two designers from the company Vois là. For comparison, the 2025 fabric took the Rhine as its theme, with a glacier-blue ground and three birds standing for France, Germany and Switzerland, and the 2024 fabric marked 800 years since the town's walls were begun.

The fabric is sold by the metre at the Boutique aux Étoffes, the city's own shop inside the market, which opens on the same days and at the same hours as the stalls. In 2026, 17 local makers have turned it into tree decorations, Advent wreaths, hot-water-bottle covers, bow ties and other small objects, and table linen made in nearby Thann completes the range. Fabrics from earlier years are also on sale. This year the two designers also have their own chalet selling tote bags, cushion covers and tablecloths cut from the 2026 print.

The city also commissions collector pieces each year. For 2026 these are an embroidered brooch made by hand in silk thread in 200 copies, and icicle ornaments and glass pine cones inspired by the fabric, made by a Mulhouse glass-bead maker who holds the Meilleur Ouvrier de France title. The Christmas candle, a new design every year since 2021, is scented with iris and leather this year and wrapped in the fabric, which is cut by a local association that supports people with disabilities.

A chalet on the Mulhouse Christmas market in 2016, its front hung with fabric panels. Image: Arnaud 25, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Place de la Réunion and the Temple Saint-Étienne

The main market fills Place de la Réunion, the old town square, and the streets around it. The square is dominated by the Temple Saint-Étienne, a Protestant church built between 1858 and 1868 in Neo-Gothic style on the site of an older church. Its spire rises 97 metres, according to the city's heritage service. Inside, the church keeps a large set of 14th-century stained-glass windows from the medieval church, one of the reasons it was listed as a historic monument in 1995. Entry is free.

The temple was closed for three years before a restoration finished in June 2023. The work, carried out in stages from 2009, cost €8.6 million and included new heating, stage lighting and exhibition rails, because the building is now used for concerts and exhibitions as well as worship. The city has not published the temple's December 2026 opening hours, so check before planning a visit around it.

The front and 97-metre spire of the Temple Saint-Étienne on Place de la Réunion. Image: Pieter Smits from La Forge, France, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

At night the chalets ring the church and the square's painted houses are lit up. The tourist office lists vin chaud, tarte flambée, choucroute with knepfle dumplings and carp with chips among the food on sale. In 2024, 58% of the goods on offer came from Alsace and about 28% from the rest of France, according to the city.

Christmas trees and lit chalets on Place de la Réunion, with the Temple Saint-Étienne behind, in December 2015. Image: questa_ta, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Chalets on Place de la Réunion at night in December 2015, with the Temple Saint-Étienne on the left. Image: questa_ta, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Hôtel de Ville and the Klapperstein

On the same square stands the Hôtel de Ville, built in 1552 when Mulhouse was an independent city allied to the Swiss cantons; its painted façade carries the coats of arms of the Swiss towns and cantons Mulhouse was allied with. In 2024 the city hung a drape of that year's fabric across the front. On one gable hangs the Klapperstein, the "gossips' stone", a carved stone that, according to the city's heritage leaflet, was once hung around the necks of women accused of spreading gossip.

The painted Hôtel de Ville on Place de la Réunion, decorated for Christmas, in January 2010. Image: Wladyslaw, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Klapperstein, the carved "gossips' stone", shown on a figure in Mulhouse's Musée historique in 2023. Image: Jocelyne, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Beyond the main square

Several events in the official 2026 programme take place a few minutes from Place de la Réunion:

• Le Marché Secret, an immersive Christmas walk in Parc Jaquet, runs from 20 November to 27 December on Fridays and Saturdays from 17:00 to 21:00 and on Sundays from 16:00 to 20:00. A visit lasts about 50 minutes, in groups of up to 25, and is recommended from age 4. Tickets are €13.99 for adults (16 and over) and €9.99 for children aged 4 to 15, online or at the kiosk on Place des Victoires.
• Maison du Patrimoine, 5 place Lambert, shows an exhibition on Mulhouse Christmas traditions and the history of the fabric from 25 November, open daily from 13:00 to 18:30 during the market except 25 and 26 December. It is also the starting point of the guided walk "La magie de Noël" at dusk (for example 21 and 28 November at 17:00), which costs €5, €3 reduced, €12 for a family, and is free for under-12s.
• Église Sainte-Marie, rue du Couvent, hosts Christmas concerts (21, 22 and 29 November and 13 December) and, on its forecourt, a charity village run by church and aid groups on Friday evenings from 18:00 to 20:00 and Saturday evenings from 18:00 to 21:00 between 4 and 19 December. Entry is free.

Families can pick up a free treasure-hunt booklet at the tourist office or the Boutique aux Étoffes and follow it around the centre during the market.

The textile museum's Christmas market

The Musée de l'Impression sur Étoffes (museum of printed fabrics), at 14 rue Jean-Jacques Henner, is where the Étoffe de Noël tradition makes most sense: its collections of printed cotton are the source of the 2026 design. In 2026 the museum shop runs its own Christmas market, "Les Jardins de l'Art nouveau", selling objects printed with motifs from the collection, from 14 November to 31 December, Wednesday to Sunday from 13:00 to 18:00 and also on Tuesdays in December. On 6 and 13 December from 15:00 to 17:00 there are guided tours with a demonstration of block printing; visitors can then print a fabric pouch themselves for €2 on top of the museum ticket.

The Musée de l'Impression sur Étoffes beside the canal in Mulhouse. Image: Ji-Elle, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Two big museums for a winter afternoon

Mulhouse has two large transport museums outside the old centre, both open over the Christmas period except on 25 December.

The Cité du Train, run with SNCF heritage, is among the ten largest railway museums in the world, according to the tourist office, with 60,000 square metres of locomotives, carriages and models. From 1 November to 31 December it opens daily from 10:00 to 17:00, and the museum suggests allowing about two and a half hours. In 2026 a full-price ticket costs €16, children aged 4 to 17 pay €12, and a family pass for four is €48. Take tram line 3 to the stop "Musées".

Locomotives in the halls of the Cité du Train in December 2014. Image: Klaus Nahr from Germany, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Cité de l'Automobile (Musée National de l'Automobile) holds more than 450 cars, most of them from the collection built up by the textile industrialists Hans and Fritz Schlumpf. Two of the six Bugatti Royale ever made are here. The museum opens every day including public holidays except 25 December, with hours that vary by day in winter (some days 10:00 to 17:00, others from 13:00), so check its calendar.

A replica of the Bugatti Royale "Esders" roadster at the Cité de l'Automobile. Image: questa_ta, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Combining Mulhouse with other markets

Regional TER trains link Mulhouse with Colmar and Strasbourg to the north and with Basel to the south, so it is easy to add a day at the Colmar Christmas markets or the Strasbourg Christmas market. Mulhouse also works as an evening trip from Basel.

Practical notes

• By train: Mulhouse is on the TGV Est and Rhin-Rhône lines, with about 40 TGV trains a day. Journey times listed by the organisers are 2 hours 40 minutes from Paris, 2 hours 45 minutes from Lyon, 1 hour 20 minutes from Zurich and 2 hours 10 minutes from Frankfurt. The Gare Centrale is in the town centre; the Temple Saint-Étienne is about 0.7 km away, roughly ten minutes on foot.
• By air: the EuroAirport (Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg) is the nearest airport.
• Tram: three tram lines and a tram-train to Thann run from about 04:30 to 23:30 on weekdays and from 07:00 to 23:30 on Sundays, every 5 to 8 minutes during the day.
• Parking: the organisers recommend the park-and-ride sites, especially on Saturdays. P+R Université (Monday to Saturday, 07:00–19:00) and P+R Nouveau Bassin (Monday to Saturday 07:00–19:30, Sunday 09:00–20:00) cost €2 a day, including a return tram ticket for every passenger in the car, up to seven. In the centre, the Porte Haute car park is free from 19:00 to 09:00 and on Sundays and public holidays.
• Timing: weekdays open later (11:00) and close earlier (20:00) than weekends. Saturday is the busiest day.
• Tourist office: 1 avenue Robert Schuman, tel. +33 (0)3 89 35 48 48.

Dates, hours and prices are as published by the City of Mulhouse, the tourist office and the museums in November 2026; check noel-mulhouse.fr before you travel.