The Palace of Aigai in Vergina, Greece – better known as Alexander the Great’s corronation place, reopens after sixteen years and $21 million worth of restorations. Now that the excavation, preservation, documentation, and, lastly, conservation are all finished, the visitors started lining up to marvel at the ancient columns, marble floors, and mesmerizing mosaics coming mainly from the 4th century BCE.

Originally built by King Aexander’s father, Philip II of Macedon, the property became known as the Royal Metropolis of the Macedonian. At one time, it was the largest and most important building in the ancient Kingdom of Macedon. Formally, it is from here that Alexander the Great ventured on his historic conquest that saw him reach all the way to Egypt. It would have been from here, too, that the ancient world got reshaped into the Hellenistic period.

Three times larger than the Parthenon (about 12,000 square meters) and being the work of an intelligent architect of the 4th c. B.C., possibly Pytheus, the palace which we parallel to the “presidential house” of the ancient kingdom of Macedons, due to its public function as an administrative centre, and which consтιтuted the model for all palaces of the hellenistic world, did not survive intact through the centuries.

Natural disasters of the 1st c. A.D. had it demolished, as well as subsequent earthquakes, the re-use of its structural materials by local inhabitants, and the natural wear of the course of time.

Therefore, only traces survive to date, which don’ t allow us to imagine its original magnificence.

The architectural study for its consolidation and restauration, undertaken by the 17th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities, not only clarifies the building’s plan to the visitor, but also enhances its third dimension, through the resтιтution of the reclaimed original ancient structural material, complemented by new material, in points of focus where this is necessary.