Marrakech Museum
A war minister's palace seized twice — once by a Pasha, once by the state — now open to anyone with a ticket.
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The Dar Mnebhi Palace was built in the early 1900s by Mehdi al-Mnebhi, Sultan Moulay Abdelaziz's minister of war. While Mnebhi was posted as ambassador in London, Pasha Thami El Glaoui's family took the palace. After independence it became a girls' school, then sat neglected until the Omar Benjelloun Foundation restored it as a museum in 1997. The building's turbulent biography competes with the collection of Moroccan historic and contemporary art inside.
What to look for
- The enormous brass chandelier suspended in the roofed central courtyard, its pieces cut into geometric and arabesque motifs
- Zellij tilework alongside painted and carved cedar wood lining the galleries that ring the courtyard
- The hammam's domed and vaulted chambers — a feature typical of large Moroccan palaces of this era
In the old center of Marrakesh; the original riad garden courtyard is now fully paved and roofed, making it a comfortable stop during midday heat.
Marrakech Museum is one of 16 sights worth the detour in Marrakesh, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Marrakesh pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Marrakesh
- Koutoubia MosqueThe 77-metre minaret that likely gave Seville's Giralda its blueprint still defines Marrakesh's skyline nine centuries on.
- Jemaa el-FnaaA square whose name is a dark joke — a sultan's grand mosque, abandoned to plague, went from "Mosque of Tranquility" to "Mosque of Ruination" by popular sarcasm.
- Majorelle GardenA French painter patented his own shade of cobalt blue — you are about to walk inside the canvas.
- Marrakesh StadiumA 45,240-seat arena already stamped by World Cup history — and carrying a design flaw critics spotted on day one.
- Ben Youssef MadrasaOnce the largest Islamic college in North Africa, built to train 800 scholars at a time.
- Menara GardensA reservoir dug in 1157, a two-story pavilion at its edge, and the High Atlas Mountains rising behind it — this is the view Marrakesh is measured against.