Madrid Palace

The Royal Palace of Madrid: What’s Actually Worth Your Time

The Palacio Real de Madrid is the official residence of the Spanish royal family, though the current king and queen choose to live at the considerably smaller Palacio de La Zarzuela in the suburbs and only use the Palacio Real for state functions. This means visitors have access to a working palace rather than a preserved relic, which creates occasional access restrictions when state visits are scheduled. Check the palace website before visiting; closures with a week’s notice are not unusual.

The palace was built on the site of a 9th-century Moorish fortress that later became a Habsburg alcázar and burned down spectacularly in 1734 on Christmas Eve. Philip V, the first Bourbon king, decided to rebuild it entirely in stone to prevent another fire, and brought in the Italian architects Filippo Juvara and then Giovanni Battista Sacchetti to design something that would compare favourably with Versailles. The result took 26 years to build and contains 3,418 rooms, of which approximately 50 are open to the public. The ones you see are among the most opulently decorated rooms in Europe.

The Main Visit

The State Rooms are the centrepiece of the tour. The Throne Room, with its ceiling painting by Giambattista Tiepolo (The Apotheosis of the Spanish Monarchy, 1764), is the room most visitors photograph. Tiepolo was 67 when he was summoned from Venice to paint this ceiling and the surrounding frescoes; he died in Madrid in 1770 before completing all the commissions. The Gasparini Room, designed with extraordinary rococo detail by Italian craftsmen, has walls covered in embroidered silk that has survived largely intact since the 18th century.

The Royal Armoury (Armería Real) is a separate admission but is among the finest collections of armour and weaponry in the world. The series of armour made for Charles V for the Italian wars of the 1530s and 1540s is extraordinary. Many of the pieces were used for actual combat, not just ceremonial display.

Buy tickets online. The savings are modest (around €1) but avoiding the queue is significant in summer. Guided tours are available in English and are worth taking if you want context; the self-guided audio tour is adequate but less compelling.

The Surroundings

The Sabatini Gardens to the north of the palace are formal French-style gardens and pleasant for a 30-minute walk, with a specific view of the palace’s north facade that most visitors miss by staying on the main approach side.

The Campo del Moro gardens to the west are less visited and more interesting: a romantic English-style landscape garden that occupies the original approach route from the Manzanares river, with the palace above it at the end of a long perspective. These gardens are accessed from a separate entrance on Paseo de la Virgen del Puerto and are completely free.

The Plaza de la Armería, the square immediately in front of the main palace facade, frames the view of the palace best in the early morning or late afternoon when the light is lower. The Cathedral of La Almudena, facing the palace from across the square, was only completed in 1993 despite a foundation stone laid in 1883. The interior is divisive; the exterior is elegant.

Madrid Beyond the Palace

The Prado Museum is the primary reason serious visitors come to Madrid, and it deserves more time than most people give it. The collection covers Velázquez, Goya, Rubens, Titian, and El Greco with extraordinary depth. The free evening opening (Monday through Saturday 6pm to 8pm, Sunday 5pm to 7pm) is worth planning around.

The Mercado de San Miguel, a covered market in a 1916 iron structure near Plaza Mayor, sells quality Spanish produce and prepared food from small stalls. It’s expensive relative to tapas bar prices and aimed at visitors, but the jamón ibérico and cheese selection is genuinely excellent. Eat enough to constitute lunch and you won’t notice the per-item cost as painfully.

For actual local eating, the bars around Calle Cava Baja in La Latina do traditional Madrid tapas (patatas bravas, croquetas, tortilla) at prices that make the Mercado de San Miguel look extractive by comparison. Bar Casa Lucio and Taberna los Huevos de Lucio are the reference points.

Practical Notes

The palace is closed on official state days; these are published on the website but can be announced with limited notice. Visiting in June or October avoids the most intense summer heat. The palace has no air conditioning in the state rooms; summer visits before 11am are considerably more comfortable.

The nearest metro stations are Ópera (lines 2 and 5) and Sol (lines 1, 2, and 3), both about 10 minutes’ walk from the main entrance.