Ibiza Art, Architecture & Culture: the back story

About Ibiza Art, Architecture & Culture: the back story

By the ULTIMATE Ibiza Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

Ibiza's fame is its music, but its culture runs far deeper. Its capital was founded by the Phoenicians, walled by a Renaissance engineer and inscribed by UNESCO; in the 1960s an international biennial brought artists to the island and left behind one of Spain's oldest museums of contemporary art. Here is the back story, and where to see it.

A Phoenician city

The story of Ibiza Town begins with the Phoenicians, who founded the city at the end of the seventh century BC. About 500 metres west of Dalt Vila, the hill of Puig des Molins was its cemetery throughout antiquity, and with more than 5,000 graves it is one of the great necropolises of the Mediterranean. Its museum, run by the Museu Arqueològic d'Eivissa i Formentera, shows the Punic collections, and you can walk among the rock-cut tombs on the hillside.

In 1999 UNESCO inscribed Ibiza, Biodiversity and Culture on its World Heritage List: four natural and cultural elements of the island, among them Dalt Vila, Puig des Molins, the Phoenician site of Sa Caleta and the Posidonia seagrass meadows that protect its waters.

Ibiza's old town is a museum you can live in: Phoenician tombs, Renaissance bastions and contemporary art on one hill.

Dalt Vila: the Renaissance walls

Dalt Vila is the fortified old town on the Puig de Vila. Designed by the Italian engineer Giovanni Battista Calvi and completed at the end of the 16th century, it has seven bastions and five gates. The main gate, the Portal de ses Taules, faces the Marina, with two Roman statues, replicas of the originals in the archaeological museum, and an inscription of 1585.

The walls are also museums. In the casemates of the Baluard de Sant Pere, films and a reproduction of the scaffolding show how the walls were built to Calvi's design, and under the vaults of the Baluard de Sant Jaume, cannons, a heavy mortar, muskets, swords, helmets and breastplates, which visitors can try on, show the military technology of the 16th to 18th centuries. Follow our ramparts walk from bastion to bastion for the views over the harbour and Sa Penya.

Below the walls, Sa Penya and the Marina are the old fishermen's and harbour quarters, a tangle of whitewashed lanes that runs down to the port. On the south coast of Sant Josep, Sa Caleta, also part of the UNESCO property, preserves evidence of the first Phoenician settlement on the island, from the eighth century BC; its people later moved to the site of Dalt Vila.

Inside the walls

At the top of the hill, the cathedral stands where the church of Santa Maria was built after the Catalan conquest of 1235. A Gothic apse and the bell tower were added in the 14th century, and the church was remodelled in the 18th century to become the cathedral of the Pitiusas. On the square beside it, the main building of the Museu Arqueològic is temporarily closed for restoration works.

On Carrer Major, the Centre d'Interpretació Madina Yabisa, in the restored Cúria building, uses audiovisuals and a large model to show the city in the Muslim period, and lets you see inside a tower of the old Arab fortress. Nearby, the Museu Puget fills Can Comasema, a noble house whose oldest part probably dates from the 15th century, with 130 oils and watercolours of Ibiza life in the early and mid 20th century by the painters Narcís Puget Riquer and Narcís Puget Viñas. It opened on 30 April 2007.

MACE and the artists' island

In 1964 the island held the first Ibiza Biennial, an international exhibition of contemporary art. It encouraged the opening, in 1969, of the Museu d'Art Contemporani d'Eivissa, MACE, one of the oldest museums of contemporary art in Spain. It occupies Simón Poulet's building of 1727 on the Baluard de Sant Joan.

After a major renovation, MACE reopened in 2012 with a new glass building in its old gardens. The works revealed Punic houses of the fourth century BC, now shown under a glass floor, so that here, more than anywhere, you see Ibiza's ancient and modern art in a single visit.

Markets and makers

The island's craft tradition lives on in its markets. On the Sant Carles road, in the municipality of Santa Eulària, Las Dalias hosts markets, a bar and events, and at Es Canar the Hippy Market Punta Arabí has its own dates and hours on its website. In Santa Eulària itself, climb from the river mouth to the white church on the Puig de Missa above the town.

Out in the south, the salt pans of Ses Salines lie within the natural park created in 2001, where flamingos feed on the ponds almost all year, best at the end of summer and in autumn. Keep to the marked paths across the dunes, which are protected.

Planning your visit

Everything in Dalt Vila is on foot and uphill, so wear good shoes, carry water in summer and give yourself a morning or an evening rather than the midday heat. Puig des Molins is a short walk west of the walls, MACE sits on its bastion near the top of the hill, and the Museu Puget and Madina Yabisa are both on Carrer Major on the way up. Our Dalt Vila in a day itinerary strings them together.

Cultural calendar

Eivissa Medieval: Ibiza Town's medieval fair, held to celebrate the UNESCO inscription of December 1999, usually takes place on the second weekend of May in Dalt Vila and the Marina; the 2026 edition ran from 7 to 10 May, and the 2027 dates will be published by the Ajuntament d'Eivissa.

MACE and the Puig des Molins museum: current exhibitions and hours are on eivissa.es and maef.eu.

What's new

The Museu Arqueològic d'Eivissa i Formentera's main building on the Plaça de la Catedral is temporarily closed for a restoration project; its Punic collections can be seen at the Puig des Molins museum. Checked October 2026 on turismo.eivissa.es.

Eivissa Medieval returned in May 2026 in its original format in Dalt Vila. Checked October 2026 on eivissa.es.

Our advice: climb Dalt Vila early in the morning or at sunset, give MACE and the Museu Puget an unhurried hour each, and walk to Puig des Molins to see where the story began.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with Ibiza Art, Architecture & Culture: the back story before you go.