Region of Crete approves €200,000 for new Archanes museum’s surrounding grounds design
The Region of Crete has approved a credit of €200,000 for a project titled “Design of the surrounding area of the new Archaeological Museum of Archanes,” according to Cretalive. The Region of Crete is the implementing body, with the Region’s Directorate of Technical Works as the supervising authority.
The decision moves forward a separate but related strand of the project while studies for the museum building itself continue. The Ministry of Culture has said those studies are on track for completion by the end of 2026.
Museum to replace the Sakellarakis collection
The new museum is intended to replace the decades-old archaeological collection founded by archaeologists Yannis and Efi Sakellarakis. Officials have described the planned facility as an asset for the Municipality of Archanes-Asterousia, reinforcing the area’s cultural profile alongside the nearby Nikos Kazantzakis Museum and the Knossos archaeological site.
Culture Minister Lina Mendoni confirmed in late May that the museum’s establishment was moving forward, at an event in Archanes also attended by Region of Crete governor Stavros Arnaoutakis and Archanes-Asterousia mayor Manolis Kokosalis. The event marked one year since six Minoan palatial centers were added to UNESCO’s World Heritage List and was dedicated to the memory of archaeologist Yannis Sakellarakis.
The Ministry of Culture said at the time that it was proceeding with the necessary studies, targeting completion by the end of 2026. The museum project is being carried out under a Programmatic Contract for Cultural Development between the Ministry of Culture, the Region of Crete and the Municipality of Archanes-Asterousia, with scientific support from the Technical University of Crete. The contract’s budget is €730,000, funded through the National Development Program of the Ministry of Culture and the Region of Crete.
A museological concept spanning prehistory to the present
The museum’s central concept, titled “In the beginning was the place,” aims to present the cultural landscape of Archanes from prehistoric times to today using contemporary display methods. The museum will be housed in the building of the former wine bottling plant belonging to the ex-Agricultural Cooperative of Archanes (SYNPE), which was handed over to the Ministry of Culture for use of the building and its grounds. The building sits on part of a 20,900-square-metre property owned by the Municipality of Archanes-Asterousia in the Ano Archanes settlement, within a designated traditional settlement area.
Under the approved building program, the museum will cover 6,330 square metres, including a 900-square-metre permanent exhibition, a temporary exhibition hall, multimedia and educational rooms, conference spaces, workshops, storage for antiquities and visitor service areas. The plans include modern accessibility and energy-efficiency infrastructure. Organizers behind related cultural projects, such as the Natural History Museum of Crete, have similarly emphasized updated visitor facilities in recent Cretan museum work.
Officials say the permanent exhibition will recount the history of Archanes from prehistoric times to the present, with roughly 1,000 objects of varying sizes planned for display, ranging from pithoi and larnakes to seal stones and jewelry. The exhibition is organized into sections covering the significance of water resources and aqueducts, ancient Archanes as an administrative and residential center, the necropolis and Mount Giouchtas as a sacred site, connections with other regions, the area’s historical trajectory into modern times, and local agricultural production, particularly wine and olive oil.
Architectural plan preserves industrial character
The architectural proposal for the building aims to make use of its distinctive structural and formal features, retaining elements of its industrial identity while adapting them for museum use. The plan also proposes extensive interventions to improve functionality, accessibility and energy performance, including a new internal circulation system using metal ramps. Similar efforts to document and preserve Crete’s archaeological heritage have featured in recent finds, such as the 1,500-year-old mausoleum uncovered at the Metropolis basilica in Messara.
Key architectural interventions include reorganizing the building’s interior levels while preserving and reusing the old storage tanks as elements of industrial heritage, reconstructing and raising the roof to strengthen the connection with the surrounding landscape, and redesigning the facades to retain the building’s industrial character using contemporary materials. Readers interested in other cultural sites across the island can find more listed among places in Crete.
