The Grandmaster's Palace, from the Knights' court to the President's office

For 450 years the Grandmaster’s Palace has been where Malta is run from, and you sense it the moment you walk in. It was the Grand Masters’ residence, then the British Governor’s palace, and now it’s the President’s office. For me it’s the visit that best explains how the Order operated when it wasn’t praying or fighting.

Four and a half centuries of power on one square

It was the first building the Knights raised in their new city, and it kept growing. VisitMalta adds that the first structure went up under Grand Master Jean de La Cassière, between 1572 and 1581, and that his successors enlarged and embellished it until it reached its present shape in the mid-18th century. Heritage Malta sums it up as a state within an edifice, which strikes me as a fair description. After the French occupation of 1798 to 1800, the British turned it into the Governor’s Palace, and in 1921 it hosted Malta’s first constitutional parliament. From independence in 1964 it housed both Parliament and the head of state. Today it’s the seat of the Office of the President of Malta, which matters for your visit, because now and then it closes for state functions.

Opposite, on St George’s Square, is the Main Guard, a guardhouse since 1604 with more than 300 wall paintings left by British soldiers between 1814 and 1972. It’s shut for conservation work at the moment, so it’s an outside-only look for now.

What the restoration has opened up

The restoration, part-funded by the EU, now lets you into over 85% of the building’s footprint. You walk through the rediscovered Uccelliera, the Piano Nobile corridors and the restored State Rooms, among them the Grand Master’s Study, the Pages’ Room and the Ambassadors’ Room. The Throne Room remains closed until further notice.

What would get me through the door even if nothing else were here is the Great Siege cycle by Matteo Perez d’Aleccio. Heritage Malta presents it as the most comprehensive visual narrative of the 1565 siege, and seeing it before or after Fort St Elmo transforms the fort. There’s more background on the Great Siege of Malta. Look up, too, at the late 18th-century illusionistic ceilings, which Heritage Malta ties to Grand Masters busy imitating the great aristocratic courts of Europe.

Why the Armoury is worth your time

The Armoury has moved house more than once. VisitMalta explains that Alof de Wignacourt transferred the arsenal to the palace in 1604, with enough weapons to equip thousands of soldiers, and put it in the hall at the back of the building, above what had been the stables. In 1975 the collection went down to the ground floor to make room for the House of Representatives. It’s now back in its original hall, which spent years as Parliament’s chamber. The House moved into that space in 1976 and stayed until it relocated to the new building by City Gate, which finally freed the room for the arms to return. The new building has its own page, on Valletta City Gate and Parliament.

Heritage Malta says the collection is considered one of the best in the world. I can’t rank it against other armouries with a source to hand, but I can tell you what’s there. You’ll see the armour of Grand Masters Alof de Wignacourt and Jean de Valette, Ottoman armour and weapons, and a selection of artillery. According to VisitMalta, what survives is only a fraction of its former splendour, with pieces from the great arms-making centres of Italy, Germany, France and Spain. Standing by the armour of the man the city is named after, a few rooms from the painting of his siege, is one of my favourite things in Valletta.

Tickets, hours and the days to avoid

Adults pay €12, youths aged 12 to 17 and over-60s €10, children aged 6 to 11 €8, and under-6s from age 1 nothing. The Multisite Pass includes it. Hours shift with the season, ten in the morning to six in the evening every day until 31 October 2026, then 09:00 to 17:00 from November to the end of February 2027, with the doors shutting to new arrivals thirty minutes before closing.

Now the part people miss. On 26 October 2026, Budget Day, the State Rooms close all day and only the Armoury is open. On three more mornings, 28 October, 18 November and 2 December, they stay closed until 13:30, and six more mornings are already listed for 2027. If you’re in town on one of those dates, go in the afternoon or move the Palace to another day.

On access, Heritage Malta says some areas can’t be fully reached by visitors with limited mobility, so if that matters to you it’s worth asking at the desk which rooms are step-free before you pay. And if you’re buying tickets one by one, remember the Palace plus Fort St Elmo, the Archaeology Museum and MUŻA already comes to €37 for an adult.

Around 300,000 people a year come through its doors, more than any other Heritage Malta site. I’d go straight after St John’s Co-Cathedral in Valletta, which opens at 09:00, and be at the Palace door for 10:00, because with somewhere this popular the first hour is the one worth having.