Mucem

The Mucem, the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations, opened in June twenty thirteen at the mouth of the old port of Marseille and gave the city a landmark to match its harbour. It is really three places joined together. The J4 building by Rudy Ricciotti, a dark cube wrapped in a lattice of fine concrete, holds the galleries and a rooftop with sea views. A slender footbridge leads from its roof across the water to Fort Saint-Jean, a medieval and seventeenth century fortress that had been closed to the public for centuries and is now free to walk, with a Mediterranean garden climbing its terraces. A few kilometres away, in the Belle de Mai district, a conservation centre stores the collections and can be visited by appointment.

The museum is about the civilisations of the Mediterranean, past and present. Its collections, inherited from the old museum of popular arts and traditions in Paris, are mostly everyday objects: tools, costumes, toys, shop signs, religious images and photographs from every shore of the sea. The ground floor of the J4 holds a semi permanent display on how the port cities of the Mediterranean were and are connected, and the upper floor stages two or three large temporary exhibitions a year, which range from ancient history to contemporary art and are usually the main reason to buy a ticket.

Even without a ticket, the site rewards a visit: the ramps of the J4, the roof terrace, the footbridge, the fort and the garden are all free, and together they offer the best walk in Marseille.