Trang Tien Bridge

Hue's graceful steel bridge of six arching spans across the Perfume River, built in 1899 and glowing with colour-changing lights every night.

Trang Tien Bridge was completed in 1899 during the French colonial period, its ironwork designed in the style of the Eiffel workshops, and it has been rebuilt after a typhoon in 1904 and twice after wartime destruction in 1946 and 1968. Its six spans of 12 lattice arches are as much a part of the city's identity as the Citadel, celebrated in songs and poems and the classic backdrop for ao dai photographs. Pedestrian walkways run along both sides, so you can cross at your own pace from the shops of Tran Hung Dao Street on the north bank to the parks and cafes of Le Loi Street on the south. Come at dusk, when the bridge is lit in slowly shifting colours and the grassy riverbanks below fill with families, street vendors and students; the Nguyen Dinh Chieu walking street starts right at its southern foot.