City Hall, 1908. Built as the Hôtel de Ville for the colonial administration. Designed by architect Gardès in French Renaissance style. After 1975 it became the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee headquarters. You can’t go inside. The Vietnamese flag flies where the French tricolor used to. Uncle Ho’s statue sits out front on Nguyen Hue, facing the river he never saw renamed after him.
Hotel Continental, 1880. The oldest hotel in Saigon still operating. Graham Greene wrote most of The Quiet American from a room here. War correspondents filed stories from the terrace bar during both the French and American wars. A glass tower now rises behind it like a different century leaning over its shoulder. A VinFast taxi and a guy on a motorbike pass where horse carriages used to pull up.
Saigon Opera House, 1897. French Third Republic style with caryatids holding up the entrance. Used as the South Vietnamese National Assembly during the war. Now it hosts performances again. And today, a couple in wedding clothes is shooting photos on the steps while a man sits on the far right watching them, completely unbothered. 127 years of history and it’s still just a backdrop for somebody’s love story.
Saigon Central Post Office. 2 Cong Xa Paris, District 1. Right across from Notre Dame.
Designed by Auguste Henri Vildieu (not Gustave Eiffel, despite what every tour guide says, though Eiffel’s influence on the iron and steel interior is widely cited). Built between 1886 and 1891. French colonial architecture with arched ceilings, iron framework, and a grand hall that feels more like a European train station than a place to buy stamps.
Inside, two huge hand-painted maps flank the entrance. One shows the telegraph lines of southern Vietnam and Cambodia from 1892. The other shows Saigon and its surroundings from the same year. Uncle Ho’s portrait hangs at the far end of the barrel-vaulted hall, watching everyone write their postcards.
The building is still a fully working post office. You can send letters, buy stamps, exchange currency. The old wooden phone booths are still there. The original tile floors are still there. The green wrought iron is still there. It has been in continuous operation for 135 years.
Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception / Commonly known as the Notre-Dame Cathedral Basilica of Saigon
The restoration started in 2017, was originally supposed to finish in 2020, got pushed to 2023 when they discovered more damage than expected, then COVID shut everything down and disrupted material shipments from Europe. The current expected completion date is 2027, with total costs now estimated at about $6 million, up from the original $4.4 million budget. (Saigoneer)
The big recent news: just last week, on March 19, they installed two new gold-plated crosses on top of the twin towers. Each cross is 3.73 meters tall, weighs over 400 kilograms, and was manufactured by Belgium’s Monument Group using solid steel finished with Italian gold leaf. The Vatican’s representative in Vietnam attended the ceremony. That’s a major milestone because it means the tower work is essentially done. (Vietnam Plus)
The remaining work includes roof repairs, stone replacement on the towers, new ventilation systems, and a future pipe organ. (Airial Travel)
It’s not open for sightseeing during renovations, but Mass still takes place, including a 9:30 AM English service on Sundays. You can still visit the grounds and the square out front with the Our Lady of Peace statue, but the building itself is behind barriers and scaffolding. (Viator)