Explorer Malaga

The Museo de Málaga joins the city's fine arts and archaeology collections in the Palacio de la Aduana, a neoclassical customs house begun in 1791 beside the Parque de Málaga. Opened there in 2016, it shows paintings and sculpture from the 16th to the 20th century, including works by Murillo, Ribera and Sorolla, and finds from prehistory to the Middle Ages.

Centre Pompidou Málaga, opened in 2015, was the first branch of the Paris Centre Pompidou outside France. It sits in El Cubo, a low building at the port designed by city architects Javier Pérez de la Fuente and Juan Antonio Marín Malavé, topped by a glass cube coloured by Daniel Buren. The galleries below show works from the Paris collection and temporary exhibitions.

Málaga Cathedral is a Renaissance cathedral built between 1528 and 1782 to plans by Diego de Siloé, with a Baroque main façade facing Plaza del Obispo. Its north tower rises 84 m; the south tower was never finished, which gave the building its nickname La Manquita, 'the one-armed lady'. The visit covers the nave and aisles, the side chapels and the carved choir.

The Alcazaba is a Moorish fortress-palace on the slope of Gibralfaro hill above Málaga's old town, begun in the 11th century and altered up to the 14th. Visitors pass through fortified gates into two walled enclosures with towers, courtyards, gardens and the rooms of a Nasrid palace. A walled corridor links it to Gibralfaro Castle, and a Roman theatre lies at its foot.

Calle Larios is the pedestrian main street of Málaga's old town, running from the Alameda Principal to the Plaza de la Constitución. Opened in 1891 and largely financed by the Larios family, it is lined with uniform buildings by Eduardo Strachan. A statue of the Marquess of Larios by Mariano Benlliure stands at its southern end; the street has been car-free since 2002.

Museo Picasso Málaga opened in 2003 in the Palacio de Buenavista, a 16th-century palace in the old town of the city where Picasso was born. Its collection, founded on gifts from Christine and Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, follows the artist's whole career in paintings, drawings, sculpture and ceramics, beside temporary exhibitions. Phoenician and Roman remains lie in the basement.

La Malagueta is Málaga's bullring, designed by Joaquín Rucoba and opened in 1876 beside the Paseo de Reding. The 16-sided Neo-Mudéjar ring seats about 9,000. A visit covers the stands, the arena and the Puerta Grande, and a museum of bullfighting history in six rooms with costumes, objects and virtual-reality displays.

The Carmen Thyssen Museum opened in 2011 in the 16th-century Palacio de Villalón and new galleries built beside it in Málaga's old town. Drawn from the collection of Carmen Cervera, it centres on 19th-century Spanish painting, mainly Andalusian, with older works such as Zurbarán's Saint Marina; excavations on the site uncovered Roman remains.

The Picasso Birthplace Museum is in the house on Plaza de la Merced where Pablo Picasso was born in 1881, part of a block of apartment buildings completed in 1872. Run by the city of Málaga, it shows family mementoes, works by Picasso and by his father José Ruiz Blasco, and prints and ceramics, with temporary exhibitions at No. 13 next door.

The Automobile and Fashion Museum occupies part of Málaga's former Royal Tobacco Factory in the Huelin district and opened in 2010. About 90 cars from 1898 onwards, by makers such as Hispano-Suiza, Bugatti, Rolls-Royce and Ferrari, are shown in themed rooms, alongside haute couture and a collection of hats from the 1920s to the 1950s.

The Colección del Museo Ruso is a municipal art centre in Málaga's former Royal Tobacco Factory of 1929. It opened in 2015 as a branch of the State Russian Museum in St Petersburg; after those loans ended in 2022, the city kept it open with exhibitions of Russian and other art lent by private collectors, alongside the MEET temporary exhibition space.