The citadel’s omnipresence, and the barrenness it evokes, is counterbalanced by the fertile expression of a garden. The primary purpose of the Garden for Peace is to foster meaningful encounters and fruitful exchanges centred on the essential endeavour of cultivating plants and living things.

Since its creation in 2003, the Garden for Peace has become an iconic place where creative talents come together, always with a touch of activism in support of biodiversity and sustainable development.

The Garden for Peace also owes its origins to a policy of cross-border cooperation between the German state of Saarland, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the Moselle department. This initiative gave rise to the ‘Gardens Without Borders’ network in 1998. In Bitche, the challenge lay in transforming a former military esplanade leading from the town to the citadel into a contemporary garden. It was therefore necessary to comply with a quality charter committing the town to making the Garden for Peace a benchmark in terms of landscape development, ecological relevance and services for the public.

Stretching four hundred metres in length and covering an area of approximately one hectare, this garden offers a succession of spaces, alternately open and enclosed, which are harmoniously arranged around a viewing walkway. This unusual layout has proved conducive to countless landscape variations, offering visitors just as many opportunities to stop and explore.

Dogs are not allowed in the garden.

New for 2026: Extra-poulations

So much for the naturist campsite – here’s the most gallant stop on the walk! The gardeners at the Jardin pour la Paix are repurposing old giant pots and fences to create a garden-cum-chicken coop where the hens reign supreme.

By recycling yesterday’s scenery, they cultivate today’s spirit: simplicity, respect for life and rustic humour. The hens, queens of this sustainable farmyard, remind us that an empty pot is not a loss, but a promise: that of returning the earth to the earth. Around them, feathery ferns, anemones, sedums, peonies and hydrangeas form a lush carpet where every leaf flutters with the breath of nature. Here, life pecks at poetry, and sustainability takes on the air of a rural ditty: nothing is lost, everything is replanted, everything is dreamed.