Naxxar's thrilling new block keeps you blissfully in the present, expert-certified 'very dangerous'
Built on a backfilled quarry, the islands' most thrilling new address keeps every visitor admirably in the present moment.
Few buildings come with a written guarantee from an independent expert. Naxxar’s newest block has one. A structural report, commissioned and signed, describes it as “clearly unstable,” “very dangerous,” and liable to fail “without warning.” You cannot buy reviews like that.
The block rises on a former hardstone quarry, its weight carried, in the assessor’s telling, by single courses of masonry and hopeful mortar. Where other foundations aim dully for permanence, this one keeps every visitor in the present moment. Nothing focuses the attention like a wall that might.
The locals confirm the effect. One nearby resident, fully alive to the heightened awareness on offer, declared they would feel “very safe” returning home each evening in the certain knowledge that the ground beside them will collapse at some point or other. We could not have phrased the appeal better ourselves.
A guarantee that goes the extra 200%
Where a more timid development might promise it is merely 100% safe, the people behind this one decline to be so cautious. There is “absolutely no danger,” the public has been assured: “not 100%, but 300%.” We have never seen a structural guarantee tripled before, and we are minded to accept all of it. Should the worst somehow occur, we are further reassured that the building will collapse considerately into its own excavated pit, disturbing no neighbour: a structure with manners.
The anticipation, too, was years in the laying. So moved were the surrounding residents that for four years they wrote to the authorities about the project without pause, brought in architects of their own, and came within a breath of involving the courts: a level of sustained public engagement most new builds can only envy. The foundations gave way, fittingly, in the section set aside for the garages. Even the parking here arrives with drama.
A Richard Serra, at no extra charge
The great sculptor once propped tonnes of steel against nothing but balance and invited you to stand beneath it. Naxxar offers the same frisson at the scale of an entire building, with the added authenticity of being unintentional. The tension is real. So, the report stresses repeatedly, is the danger.
See it while it stands
This is, by any honest measure, a Last Chance attraction. The hoarding is up, the order to stop is served, and the structure waits in the particular calm that only a backfilled quarry can provide. We recommend viewing from a generous and respectful distance, which is in any case the only kind currently permitted.
