Stop 15 of 25
Is-Suq tal-Belt
The Victorian market, in iron and glass
Free to hear. You have 3 of three free stops left, on any tours.
Guide to Is-Suq tal-Belt
The city market is the one building on the walk put up for shopping rather than praying, fighting or governing: a stone front on Merchants Street with a roof of iron and glass behind it, built in 1859–61 and among the earliest iron-framed buildings in Malta. Bombed in 1942 and left to decay, it reopened as a food hall in 2018.
An idea from London and Paris
The architect was Hector Zimelli, and the model was the covered market that had become the civic building of the age in the big European capitals. Slender cast-iron columns carry a roof of iron and glass over a hall that for a century sold the city its fish, vegetables, meat and bread.
Stalls were rented by the week, and the same families held them for generations.
Bombed, patched, abandoned
The market was hit in 1942, at the height of the bombing, and the roof came down. It was repaired, but as the city lost residents through the second half of the twentieth century the building slowly fell apart, until by the 1990s it was a half-empty shed with a leaking roof.
The 2018 rebuilding
The restored iron frame reopened in 2018, the year Valletta was European Capital of Culture, as a food hall with a market in the basement and counters and stalls above. Purists grumble that it is no longer a market, with some justice. It is also the best place on the walk to sit down with a plate of something.
What to look at
- The cast-iron columns inside — slender, fluted, and doing all the work
- The stone front, designed so the iron building would not offend the street
- The basement market, which is closer to what the building used to be
Practical
- Food
- Counters serving Maltese and international food from late morning until late. Free to enter.
- Facilities
- Toilets inside, and shade at midday.
Walk to stop 16 · The Grandmaster's Palace
The long plain wall across Merchants Street from the market is the back of the Palace. Follow it to the corner of Archbishop Street, turn left up the short block to Republic Street, and the Palace courtyard entrance is on your left.
About 4 min · 233 m
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