Malta’s move away from its fuddy-duddy package-holiday image is gaining momentum. Lonely Planet decreed the capital, Valletta, a “must-visit” 2015 destination, thanks to an architectural overhaul focused around star architect Renzo Piano’s project that will see a new parliament building, City Gate and open-air opera house opening later this year. In the meantime, DJ Annie Mac is putting the island on the party map by hosting the first Lost and Found festival there, featuring three days of beach-and-boat parties and open-air raves taking place from 3-5 April. You couldn’t get much further from the blue-rinse coach parties of old.
Palazzo Prince d’Orange, Valletta
This 17th-century diplomat’s mansion has had the full-dream makeover, with large apartments featuring modern kitchens and airy balconies looking over the Valletta roofscape. The key is flexibility. You can either rent the full penthouse or one of the double bedrooms, which are all a good-size. Interconnecting doors mean the lift either has keyed access to your own private apartment floor, or a more conventional hallway where you access your room. There are several apartments and the owners are aiming towards hotel-style service with a reception desk, part-time concierge and basement gymnasium with treatment room. The baroque splendour of the house hasn’t been lost, a double-height drawing room with enormous windows is gracefully decorated, furnished with Chippendale chairs, and the entrance off the narrow street is suitably grand. There’s even a terrace on the roof to catch the rays.
316 St Paul Street, +356 2123 1099, palazzoprincemalta.com. Doubles from €95 a night. The penthouse sleeps four and varies from €280 to €320 a night
Palazzo San Pawl, Valletta
Large parts of Valletta’s Renaissance splendour survive intact despite the ravages of tourism. To best explore this Unesco world heritage site, do it from the inside. Palazzo San Pawl is one of a handful of 17th-century townhouses now split into modest apartments for short stays. You enter it through large heavy doors from the narrow street, leading to a cool, leafy courtyard – complete with gurgling fountain and koi carp under an atrium four storeys high. The suntrap roof terrace overlooks the city’s fortified Grand Harbour and is reached either by well worn marble stairs or lift. The owner, a doctor, lives in the building and happily explains where the butcher, the greengrocer and market are to supplement the kitchen essentials of local bread and jam, Cisk beer and Maltese wine that are supplied. Rentals are for a minimum of three days for two-room apartments. St Paul Street runs through the city’s ancient heart, all tiny shops and dark alleyways which are quiet at night, spookily so: there are no nightclubs near here but even late at weekends Valletta is safe to stroll around.
318 St Paul Street, +356 9942 3110, livinginvalletta.com. Prices start at €95 a night
Trabuxu Boutique Living, Valletta
Valletta is small but at its northern end, which is more residential and known as Due Balli, gentrification has been slower, and things are a little funkier as a result. The owners of Trabuxu wine bar and bistro have converted an ancient residential property into apartments that vary in theme from SoHo Loft to Roman Dolce Vita to, bizarrely, neolithic. There’s more than a nod to a riad: the centre being a bright courtyard. Breakfast is fresh fruit and local pastries, juices and excellent coffee, which is just as well given the dearth of cafes nearby. This is a fascinating area to explore now before more development takes place; a boarded-up toy shop turned out to be a neighbourhood bar where the neighbours weren’t British expats or tourists but locals.
84 Hospital Street, +356 2122 6196, trabuxuboutiqueliving.com. Doubles from €100 a night
The British Hotel, Valletta
If you prefer uncomplicated and cheap and cheerful, the faded grandeur of the British Hotel is currently being buffed up and should suit. Due to reopen in April 2015, this two-star hotel has one real trick up its sleeve: the most spectacular view over Valletta’s Grand Harbour – ask for a front facing room. The large rooms all have private bathrooms. It sits in a quaint backstreet area of tiny bars and shops, stepped alleyways free from traffic, and several of Malta’s 365 churches. It’s also a five-minute walk from the new Renzo Piano project: the parliament building, City Gate and open-air opera house, all of which have been the subject of local controversy but are now complete and due to open during 2015.
40 Battery Street +356 2122 4730, britishhotel.com. Doubles from £55 a night
Indulgence Divine, Vittoriosa
The picturesque way to leave Valletta on foot is by the modern Barrakka lift (€1) down a cliff face to the commuter ferry (€1.50) across the harbour to what are known collectively as the Three Cities. One of them, Birgu, is also known as Vittoriosa: the history of Malta has left most places with at least two names from different periods. It’s an urban enclave of narrow lanes, fronted nowadays by a marina, but remains effectively tourist-free. It has a colourful political history which includes the HQ of the Spanish Inquisition, and exemplary public housing, many still the homes of former dockworkers. You can only explore the warren of alleyways on foot, there are no cars and precious little parking nearby, nor are there any hotels either – yet. As with Valletta homes are now being converted. Indulgence Divine is one. It sleeps two, very comfortably, the huge double bed is set inside the former private chapel of the house, but there’s also an equally enormous sofa upstairs. The owner has refurbished with care, retaining a secret room as a library, spiral stairways, and roof terrace. He’s splashed bright colour here and there among more traditional tapestries and artworks and there’s Wi-Fi, a state-of-the-art kitchen and a rather glam walk-in double shower. The rate includes pickup from the airport and basic essentials on arrival. In addition to a couple of wine bars, Del Borgo and Il Forn, there’s a tiny osteria just across the alleyway and a handful of shops and bars.
6 Triq Alessandru VII, UK contact: 07813 988827, indulgencedivine.com. Rooms from £84 a night, minimum booking five nights
Xara Palace Relais and Chateaux, Mdina
Mdina is Malta’s crown jewel and the island’s ancient capital. Set high on a hill it’s a walled city free of traffic, only a few residents’ cars are allowed in, and it is atmospheric to wander around off season before the tourists start to overwhelm it. The only hotel is the Xara Palace, generally regarded as Malta’s best, and although it appears to have been there forever, it’s less than 20 years old. There are 17 rooms of restrained palatial swaggery with velvet and plush haberdashery to be had for reasonable rates outside the summer peak. It has high ceilings, creaky floors and proper mortice locks. Room 8 looks over the urban sprawl reaching out from Valletta on the horizon and is as comfortable as you might imagine regal splendour to be. The restaurant has the same view from a terrace. At sundown dinner is romantic, offering a menu of refined, elaborate dishes with fish sourced locally and game, such as tender venison.
Misrah il-Kunsill +356 2145 0560, xarapalace.com.mt. Doubles from £95 a night
The Juliani Hotel, St Julians
Not far from Valletta, St Julian’s, specifically Spinola Bay, retains a wistful nostalgia for many Maltese who remember the two-storey houses circling the pretty shore before they all had apartment blocks built on top. Malta’s first “boutique” hotel, the Juliani, overlooks the water. Entry is directly off the street into an open lounge where breakfast is served and there’s also a rooftop pool. Front-facing rooms all have balconies overlooking the bobbing boats, while junior suites accommodate two with plenty of room to spare – and the bathrooms have jacuzzis. The building is the owner’s former family home, it was extended upwards, as with the neighbours. The first-floor restaurant, Zest, is a glossy affair serving an east-meets-west fusion menu, though it does retain original features, such as the family crest.
25 St.George’s Road, +356 2138 8000, hoteljuliani.com. Doubles from €85 a night
Port View Guest House, Marsaxlokk
Marsaxlokk is Malta’s picture-postcard fishing village, its harbour full of the brightly coloured dgħajsa inshore boats, their owners usually busy fixing and drying their nets. It’s the focus of a thousand holiday snapshots and as a consequence the weekly fish market for the island has expanded into a fully fledged street market for tourists, creating traffic jams and a bit of jostling around the quaysides. In a little side street, just a few yards from the water’s edge, is the Port View Guest House. It opened a year ago and is run by a local family, mostly father Carmel Azzopardi and his son, Andrew. The place is a clean, plain, modern B&B; the rooms are large enough to accommodate families and some have sea views, there’s even a couple of balconies but the rooftop breakfast terrace has the best view of all over the harbour.
18 Triq il- Luzzu, +356 9949 2961, portview.com. Doubles from €50 a night
Hotel Ta’ Cenc and Spa, Sannat, Gozo
The landscape of the island of Gozo (a 20-minute ferry crossing from Cirkewwa) is attractively simple: farmland interspersed with villages that are dominated by large churches all hewn from the local sandy coloured stone. There are a few beaches here and there, mostly rock rather than sand and the island has become popular for diving. In the south is the village of Sannat, where the low-lying architecture virtually encompasses Ta’ Cenc, the island’s best hotel. It consists of dozens of small cottages spread around swimming pools and extensive stonework, with open views across the surrounding coast. The main building includes a sizeable spa with a seductive inside-outside pool. Out of season the rooms are reasonable; it’s packed during the school holidays and charges accordingly. By far its best feature is Kantra, an isolated barbecue area reached via a minibus, or a long walk through lush flowers and grassland. Its parasols and loungers, bar and a barbecued prawns are popular with walkers on a pitstop, locals who arrive by boat, and the more horizontally inclined who just want to lie in the sun. All come for the beautiful view overlooking Comino with Malta in the distance. Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt took over the whole hotel for five months while filming By The Sea.
Triq Ta’ Cenc, Sannat, Gozo, +356 2219 1000, tacenc.com. Doubles from €190 a night
Thirty Seven Gozo, Munxar, Gozo
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