Work continues apace on the creation of the National Museum of Maritime Antiquities in Piraeus, which will be ready to welcome visitors in 2026.

The new building under construction is organically connected to the industrial building of SILO, on its southwestern side, in order to provide the necessary space for the hosting of a pioneering and innovative Museum. More than 2,500 exhibits will be displayed and a wide range of technological applications will be presented, with well-equipped maintenance laboratories and storage areas. Alongside the new building, the conveyor belt, which used to serve the loading of the ships, will be highlighted and displayed. The National Museum of Maritime Antiquities will showcase the treasures of the Greek seas, while at the same time it will be the emblematic cultural landmark for the country’s largest port.

The Minister of Culture, Lina Mendoni, said: “A decades-old vision is now entering the final stretch for its realisation and completion. The development of our country, from prehistory to the present day, is directly linked to the sea, shipping and seafaring. The main purpose of the creation of the National Museum of Maritime Antiquities is, through the findings of our seas, to showcase Greek civilization in its long history and uninterrupted duration, in a place where exclusively maritime antiquities will be exhibited. These are the characteristics we want to highlight in the National Museum of Maritime Antiquities, almost unique in its kind: It is an emblematic work of culture, in a landmark building for Piraeus, on the Ionian Coast. We are preserving and highlighting an important industrial building, the SILO, which we are connecting with a modern building. This creates the necessary conditions for the creation of a model, innovative museum. The unique wealth of the Greek seas is given the ideal place to be hosted. The design of the exhibition space results from the constraints of the geometry and structure of the existing shell and its expansion. The structure and layout of the building defines an exhibition developed in area, which in turn requires approaches that make it readable for visitors. It requires rest and break areas, making it necessary to differentiate from space to space/thematic section, so that the public can more easily perceive the succession of themes, constantly finding new points of interest. We make use of modern technological means and will deliver, in 2026, another important Museum fully accessible, offering its visitors a unique experience of diving into the past, with stations in time, sunken settlements, shipwrecks, ship models, hulls and cargoes of merchant ships, maps and charts. It is clear that the operation of this Museum introduces Piraeus to international cultural destinations.”. 

The central objective of the museographic design is to ensure universal accessibility both on a physical level (ramps, elevators, spacious spaces for movement between exhibits) and on an intellectual level (grading of information material, touch exhibits, information reading levels, etc.). The performance of the exhibition scenario is achieved – mainly through the use of showcases (mainly built-in or freely arranged in the space), pedestals and special structures, exhibition lighting, digital media and applications, visual – information material and signage in printed and/or digital form.

The processing and “maturation” of the museological study at the stage of its assembly with the corresponding museographic one, dictated the modification of the 2021 study. In the final museological study – which recently received the positive opinion of the Museum Council of the Ministry of Culture – the changes identified relate to the exhibition material, which is increased by about 300 finds, exceeding 2. 500 exhibits, the structure of the exhibition narrative, which is given new sections, re-evaluated and refined, and the final choice of accompanying interpretive media, which vary and cover a wide range of options, from conventional and digital interpretive media to staging environments and models. The exhibition narrative is structured around six thematic axes:

1. Sea, Environment, Man,
2. Maritime Archaeology, 
3. “Time capsules” on the seabed…stations in time”,
4. Approaching the past in fragments. An open issue to be managed,
5. Maritime cultural heritage open to society,
6. Silo and Piraeus, interconnected stories. The route of the exhibition is predetermined and starts from the building of SILO, where the thematic axes 1 and 2 will be located.

Thematic axis 3, which is the most important and richest in finds, is located in the new building. Axis 4 is located almost on the same level as axis 3. Thematic axis 5 is developed on two levels, which are connected by a scale. Thematic axis 6 is placed inside the conveyor belt, where the visitor transitions from the +8.85m level of the new building.

The visitor can tour the “inside” of the existing building, see places to which he would not normally have access, and in this way understand its operation. The structure of the granary cells is revealed to the visitor while navigating the exhibition through a smooth ramped route, a continuous line that follows the sequence of the thematic sections of the museum study presented in both the existing and the extension sections.