San Anton Palace

Where it sits. San Anton Palace stands at the meeting point of Attard, Balzan and Lija — the three inland villages that Maltese call It-Tliet Irħula — about six kilometres west of Valletta on the road that runs from Birkirkara towards Attard. It is not a hilltop or a harbour building, and it was never meant to be defensive. It sits low in the middle of what was once open agricultural country, surrounded by a high rubble and ashlar wall enclosing roughly eight hectares of gardens. The palace is the official residence of the President of Malta and is normally closed; the gardens beside it are free, open daily, and among the most used public green spaces on the island.

The story behind it. The core of the building was raised in the early seventeenth century as a country villa for Antoine de Paule, a French knight of the Order of St John who later became Grand Master, and who named it for his patron saint. When he was elected in 1623 the villa was enlarged into something closer to a palace, with an arcaded courtyard, a chapel and a formal garden laid out on the axis of the house. Successive Grand Masters used it as a summer retreat away from the closed, fever-prone streets of Valletta. Under British rule from the early nineteenth century it became the residence of the Governor, which is how it acquired its lawns, its ornamental trees and a distinctly imperial habit of commemorative planting. Since Malta became a republic in 1974 the palace has housed the head of state, and part of the grounds serve as the presidential offices.

The gardens. The gardens were opened to the public in the 1880s and have been continuously accessible since, which makes them one of the oldest public parks in the country. The layout is a formal grid of walks divided by clipped hedges and stone kerbs, with a central axis of citrus, avenues of cypress and araucaria, and pockets of much older planting. Several trees are believed to date to the palace's early years, and the collection includes jacaranda, ficus, date palm, Norfolk Island pine, bougainvillaea trained across arches, and beds replanted seasonally. Ponds hold ducks, swans and terrapins, and a small aviary keeps the peacocks and pheasants that children come for. Scattered through the walks are commemorative trees planted by visiting heads of state, each with a plaque — an accidental diplomatic archive that runs from colonial governors to modern presidents.

What you actually see today. Entry is through a gate on Triq Birkirkara, straight into deep shade. The temperature difference between the street and the interior of the gardens on a July afternoon is startling — the combination of high walls, mature canopy and standing water makes this one of the coolest public spaces in central Malta. The palace itself presents a long, plain façade of dressed limestone with a clock and a bell turret; the ceremonial entrance, guarded and flagged, is used for state occasions. In spring the gardens host the national horticultural show, when the walks fill with competition stands of cut flowers, citrus and vegetables. Wedding parties queue for photographs by the fountains most Saturdays, and school groups arrive on weekday mornings.

Nearby. A short walk away, still in Attard, is Villa Bologna, an eighteenth-century private house whose gardens are open on a ticketed basis and include a working pottery. The Attard parish church of St Mary, an early seventeenth-century building attributed to Tommaso Dingli and one of the best-preserved late-Renaissance church façades in Malta, is a few minutes further on. Surviving arches of the Wignacourt Aqueduct run along the road between Attard and Balzan, so the whole cluster can be walked in a single morning without a car.

Getting there and timing. Buses from Valletta and from Sliema towards Attard and Rabat stop within a few minutes' walk of the gate; drivers will find limited street parking on the Attard side. The gardens open daily from early morning until dusk, with no charge, and the paths are broad, level and gravel or paved, which makes them navigable with a wheelchair or a pushchair. February to May is the best window — the orange and lemon trees flower, the beds are at full strength, and the jacaranda comes into blue flower in late spring. Summer visits work well in the first hour after opening or the last two hours before closing, when the light comes through the avenues at an angle and the shade is deepest. Winter afternoons after rain are quiet, green and almost empty, and the ponds are at their fullest.