Quebec has long been nicknamed “la belle province,” but based on a new ranking from Maclean’s, it might be time to start calling it “la cool province” too.
The magazine recently tapped its pool of writers to name the coolest neighbourhoods across the country, and the resulting list reads like a cross-Canada bucket list for anyone skipping a trip south this summer.
Maclean’s points out that Canadian travel to the U.S. is down 42% over the past year and a half, and a lot of that redirected wanderlust is being channeled closer to home instead.
Ten neighbourhoods made the cut in total, stretching from Edmonton to Halifax, and two of them happen to be right here in Quebec.
Saint-Sauveur, Quebec City
While le Vieux-Québec remains the capital city’s main attraction, it’s not the coolest part of town. That honour belongs to Saint-Sauveur.
The area, which is home to less than 20,000 people, sits in Quebec City’s Lower Town, tucked between a bend in the Saint-Charles River and the bluff separating it from the Upper Town. Its main commercial strip, Rue Saint-Vallier Ouest, fell on hard times through the ’80s and ’90s, but the neighbourhood has spent the last decade or two filling back in with cafés, bakeries, bars and independent shops, without losing the community feel that made it a working-class stronghold in the first place.
Nowadays, it features a vibrant local food scene, craft breweries, community parks, and plenty of multiculturalism.
Maclean’s writer Pablo Strauss, who has lived there for nearly three decades, notes how the area’s “modest origins have preserved its character.”
Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie, Montreal
On the Montreal side, Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie took home all the cool points this year. It’s the city’s third-most populous borough, home to more than 141,000 residents across roughly 16 square kilometres northeast of downtown.
These days it’s known for leafy streets, a food scene anchored by the Jean-Talon Market (one of the largest open-air markets on the continent), and around a hundred parks and green spaces, including the Botanical Garden, where day-drinking is technically allowed as long as it counts as a picnic.
Maclean’s writer Caitlin Stall-Paquet, who moved to the borough in 2024, summed up the neighbourhood’s café culture best, joking that the coffee comes in “more styles than your nervous system can handle.” Between the market stalls, the patios and the parks doubling as picnic grounds, it’s easy to see why the borough made the cut.
The full list, along with each writer’s full essay, is available on Maclean’s.