Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Culture Minister Lina Mendoni inaugurated a new museum of antiquities in Thessaloniki on Saturday morning, housing artifacts uncovered during the construction of the city’s metro system and spanning more than two millennia of urban history.

The entrance to the Thessaloniki Metro Archaeological Museum in Thessaloniki.

The prime minister stands in front of a display case featuring exhibits from the Thessaloniki Metro Archaeological Museum.

The museum, named “Thessalonikeon Mitropolis,” is housed in the landmark Barracks A3 building within the Pavlos Melas Metropolitan Park and opens to the public on Sunday, May 10, from 08:30 to 15:30, except on Tuesdays.

A view of the interior of the museum.

The collection covers finds dating from the city’s founding in 316 B.C. through to the great fire that devastated Thessaloniki in 1917. Exhibits are organized across two floors according to the excavation sites from which they were recovered, drawing on finds from multiple metro stations both inside and outside the city’s ancient walls. The courtyard displays detached mosaic floors, hypocaust heating systems, and walls from a Roman villa unearthed at the Agia Sofia station.

The facade of “Thessalonikeon Metropolis.”

Mitsotakis, who toured the museum with Mendoni, used the inauguration to highlight what he called the broader cultural and urban transformation of Thessaloniki, including the completion of its metro network and major infrastructure works reshaping the city’s western districts.

Culture Minister Lina Mendoni gives Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis a tour of “Thessalonikeon Metropolis.”

Mendoni said total public investment in culture in Thessaloniki would reach €200 million.