Mercury Towers

The tower is Zaha Hadid Architects' and the practice says so itself, with Annamaria Attard Montalto as architect of record and J. Portelli Projects as developer. It stands on a 9,405-square-metre site and keeps the remaining façades of the old Mercury House, which date from 1903 and had stood derelict for over twenty years, along with two underground vaults cut during the Cold War. At 112 metres it is the tallest building in Malta, displacing the Portomaso Business Tower, which this register also holds.

Three figures do not agree, and the register publishes the disagreement rather than choosing. The storeys are 31 by the architect's own account — a nine-storey residential volume, a nineteen-storey hotel volume and three transitional floors — and 31 on the Council on Tall Buildings' record; the developer's own page says 33. The residences are 275 on the Council's record and 256 on its selling agent's; the developer publishes no number at all. And the hotel is 48 rooms on the Council's record against Melíá's own count of 113 rooms, 27 suites and 35 residences — where the operator's figure is the one to prefer, because the operator is the party that knows.

ME Malta, by ME by Melíá, opened on 1 November 2024, which makes this one of two Melíá-operated records in this register, beside the Residences at Melíá Seychelles. Agents publish residences from EUR 288,000 for a one-bedroom to around EUR 3,000,000, one to three bedrooms. No completion date is agreed either: the Council records 2024, the architect's own project timeline runs to 2026, and the hotel opened in between.

Malta's Special Designated Areas are a property-law exemption under the Immovable Property (Acquisition by Non-Residents) Act, Chapter 246: article 5(1)(b) disapplies the permit requirement for “the acquisition of immovable property by any person, wherever resident, in a special designated area.” It confers no immigration status. Since the Court of Justice's ruling of 29 April 2025 and Legal Notice 159 of 2025, no property purchase in Malta leads to Maltese citizenship; the Permanent Residence Programme's EUR 375,000 threshold is separate and applies anywhere in Malta or Gozo, SDA or not.

Sources

• legislation.mt (Immovable Property (Acquisition by Non-Residents) Act, Chapter 246 of the Laws of Malta — article 2 defining a special designated area and article 5(1)(b) disapplying the permit requirement for ‘the acquisition of immovable property by any person, wherever resident, in a special designated area’; First Schedule listing twenty-seven zones — https://legislation.mt/eli/cap/246/eng)
• curia.europa.eu (Court of Justice of the European Union, press release CP 52/25, Case C-181/23 Commission v Malta, Grand Chamber, 29 April 2025: ‘A Member State cannot grant its nationality – and indeed European citizenship – in exchange for predetermined payments or investments, as this essentially amounts to rendering the acquisition of nationality a mere commercial transaction.’ — https://curia.europa.eu/site/upload/docs/application/pdf/2025-04/cp250052en.pdf)
• zha.com (Zaha Hadid Architects' own project page: a nine-storey residential volume, a nineteen-storey hotel volume and three transitional floors, 31 storeys; the 9,405 m² site; the retained 1903 Mercury House façades, derelict over twenty years; two Cold War underground vaults; project timeline 2016–2026 — https://www.zha.com/projects/architecture/mercury-tower)
• jportelliprojects.com (the developer's own page, describing a 33-storey residential tower and publishing no unit count — https://www.jportelliprojects.com/project/mercury-towers/)
• skyscrapercenter.com (Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat: 112 m, 31 floors above ground, 275 apartments, 48 hotel rooms, completion 2024 — https://www.skyscrapercenter.com/building/mercury-tower/33735)
• meliahotelsinternational.com (the operator's own newsroom: ME Malta by ME by Melíá opening 1 November 2024 with 113 rooms, 27 suites and 35 residences — https://www.meliahotelsinternational.com/en/newsroom/our-news/me-by-melia-arrives-in-malta)
• remax-malta.com (selling agent: one to three bedrooms from EUR 288,000 to about EUR 3,000,000 — https://remax-malta.com/mercury-towers)
• AGENTS' CLAIM, not verified — christiesrealestatemalta.com, franksalt.com.mt and maltasothebysrealty.com variously describe Mercury Tower as Zaha Hadid's final project and as one of the last projects she signed off. Hadid died in March 2016 and Zaha Hadid Architects' own page makes no such claim; the register records the claim and its source and does not adopt it. belair.com.mt 10.09.2025 adds a mid-height twist and 31 storeys, agreeing with the architect against the developer.

Pages read are linked.

• curia.europa.eu
• jportelliprojects.com
• legislation.mt
• meliahotelsinternational.com
• remax-malta.com
• skyscrapercenter.com
• zha.com

Verification

Official source

Checked

Inventory

From official source

Sources disagree

storeys 31 (architect, CTBUH) against 33 (developer); residences 275 (CTBUH) against 256 (Frank Salt); hotel rooms 48 (CTBUH) against 113 rooms plus 27 suites (Melíá). Unresolved and published as such.

Property confirmation

Pending

Last verified

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Booking

Private Residences records addresses; it does not broker them. Enquiries are passed to the party named in the record, and nothing on this site is an offer.

Classified by The Resort Collection House · Edition 2026 · PR-D-291