Piața Unirii is the main square on the south side of the Crișul Repede, and it works as both the geographic and social centre of the city. Three of Oradea's most important buildings face onto it — the Church with the Moon, the Black Vulture Palace, and the City Hall with its slender clock tower — and on summer evenings the square fills with families, students and street musicians until well after midnight.
It was thoroughly repaved and replanted in the 2010s, with new fountains and a clearer pedestrian layout, and the result is one of the most pleasant central squares in Romania. Cafe terraces ring the perimeter, and the equestrian statue of Mihai Viteazul (Michael the Brave) in the middle is the standard meeting point.