Auberge de Castille’s pristine white façade is a sight to behold after its expensive restoration.

But the light Maltese stone has already been tarnished in at least one place with what appears to be a rusty trail coming from a metal bracket that supports a light tube.

The bracket is part of the controversial lighting system installed last year on the façade when LED lighting tubes and wires were fixed to the building.

The system required physical interventions on the building, such as drilling of holes for cables to pass through the decorative stone ledges and the attachment of fixtures to support the lighting tubes.

The brackets were screwed into the stone and the black and brown trail of rust on one of the fixtures at the top right of the central doorway appears to have stained the stone.

According to the conditions imposed by the Cultural Heritage Superintendence, cables had to be colour-coded to blend in with the stone and all interventions had to be of a reversible nature.

However, the Superintendence had failed to say whether the lighting system was in line with the conditions when it was pointed out that white cables were used. The Superintendence had said it hoped “corrections” would be made.

Eventually, the white cables were painted magnolia to blend in with the stone and the gaping holes in the stone ledges were plastered. The project, which should see similar LED light tubes mounted on St James Cavalier and the Malta Stock Exchange building in Castille Square, was entrusted to RVC Ltd, which won a government tender worth €300,000.

The lighting system came in for harsh criticism last year from architects and conservation experts over its aesthetic inappropriateness and its physical impact on the historical building. The Archbishop had also entered the fray when he indirectly referred to the lit up façade as giving Castille a touch of Las Vegas.

The lighting design has since been toned down to better blend in with the uplighters at ground level.