Casablanca's Museum of Photography by Tadao Ando: hours, prices and a medina visit without your bags

Casablanca has a new museum, and not just any museum. Since 23 June 2026, the Museum of Photography and Visual Arts has been open in the old medina, on rue Larache. The building is by Tadao Ando, the Japanese architect, and it is his only project on the African continent. If you pass through Casablanca between two trains, it is a very good reason to leave the station. Here are the hours, the prices and how to plan the visit without dragging a suitcase through the alleys.

A Tadao Ando museum in the old medina

The museum stands on a site full of history: it was built on the ruins of a 19th-century foundouk, the old buildings where merchants and caravans stopped. According to Le360, the Fondation Nationale des Musées (FNM) took over the museum on 30 January 2026 under an agreement with the wilaya of Casablanca, and it opened on 23 June 2026, in the bicentenary year of the invention of photography.

Tadao Ando's name alone draws architecture lovers. But even if you are not an expert, the contrast is worth the trip: a contemporary building slipped into the tight fabric of a medina, among its shopping lanes.

The opening exhibition, "CASA"

For its opening, the museum shows "CASA", an exhibition about Casablanca and its people, seen as a many-sided city in constant motion. According to the official FNM page, it brings together Moroccan and foreign photographers, including Sultan Moulay Abdelaziz, Lalla Essaydi and Jean-Christophe Ballot, among about fifty others. Le360 adds that it spreads over three floors. No end date has been published: check the FNM website before you go if you are coming for this exhibition in particular.

Hours, prices and address

This information comes from the museum's official page, checked on 29 October 2026. The page is a little contradictory (it says "Monday to Sunday" and then closed on Tuesday), so do not plan your visit on a Tuesday, and check fnm.ma the day before.

Bags first: Troplo Coffee near Casa-Voyageurs

BoxSpot's Casablanca point is Troplo Coffee Casa Voyageurs, a café in the Chadia / La Villette area, about a 17-minute walk from Casa-Voyageurs station. You book online, show your booking at the counter, and the partner scans your QR code and takes a timestamped photo of your bags. When you come back, they are only handed over against that same QR code.

• Monday to Friday: 7am to 10pm.
• Saturday: 7am to 7pm.
• Sunday: 10am to 6pm. As the museum also closes at 6pm, on a Sunday you need to leave the medina early enough to collect your bags before the café closes.

There is no BoxSpot point in the old medina or at Casa-Port. If you are in transit to Mohammed V airport, there is also a point in Bouskoura, Café Mosquée Al Haq, about 1.2 km from Bouskoura station, open daily from 7am to 11pm.

Getting to the museum from the station

Arriving at Casa-Voyageurs

1. Drop your bags at Troplo Coffee (about a 17-minute walk, or a few minutes by red petit taxi).
2. Go back to Casa-Voyageurs and take the T1 tram to Place des Nations Unies, or take a petit taxi straight to the old medina. Ask for the meter when you get in.
3. From Place des Nations Unies, enter the medina through the gate below the clock tower or through Bab Marrakech, and follow your GPS to rue Larache.

Arriving at Casa-Port

Casa-Port is the station closest to the medina, and the museum is within walking distance of it. Our drop-off point, however, is on the Casa-Voyageurs side: with a suitcase, first take a petit taxi to Troplo Coffee, then head back to the medina hands-free. See the other options on the Casablanca luggage storage page.

A typical half-day, suitcase-free

Example for a Saturday, with an evening train:

• 10:30: drop your suitcase at Troplo Coffee.
• 11:15: arrive in the old medina and visit the museum (allow at least 1 to 1.5 hours for three floors).
• 13:00: lunch, then a walk through the lanes to the Sqala, the old bastion on the harbour side.
• 16:00: back by tram or taxi, collect your suitcase around 16:30, then on to Casa-Voyageurs.

With a little more time, add the Habous quarter and the Central Market: our itinerary Casablanca in half a day between two trains sets out the routes and the time to allow.

How much does it cost?

For the half-day above, from 10:30 to 16:30, your suitcase stays 6 hours: 6 x 9 MAD = 54 MAD for one bag. With museum admission at 50 MAD for a foreign visitor, the visit costs you 104 MAD, bag included. With two bags, storage comes to 108 MAD for the 6 hours.

Payment is online, in dirhams, by card.