Naoura Barriere

Hotel description

If ever there’s a hotel scene that could stand some shaking up, it’s Marrakech. Here your choices are pretty strictly limited: a tiny riad in the medina, a sprawling resort in the Palmeraïe, or the very rare luxury hotel that’s neither one nor the other. In this town a city-center luxury boutique, however classic, comes off as something almost revolutionary. Which goes some way towards explaining the appeal of Naoura Barrière.

This is the medina, the scenic old town, but accessible — you can entirely bypass the “lost down an endless warren of alleyways” portion of your holiday, and pull up straight to the hotel. And once inside you’ll find it’s a very palatable blend of the familiar and the foreign, roughly one part contemporary Parisian chic and one part history-steeped Moroccan romance.

The suites (they’re all at least juniors) are stylish and contemporary, no comforts spared, with charms from the high-tech to the low: from plasma televisions to good old-fashioned private balconies. Unlike the riad hotels it’s more about luxury and less about theater; and unlike the out-of-town resorts it’s still packed with Marrakech medina personality.

Add a full-service spa, a full complement of business services, and the Marrakech branch of the famous Fouquet’s restaurant, and you’ve got yourself an experience that’s confidently world-class, and yet shot through with local color — if there’s a better definition of what a good luxury hotel ought to be, we haven’t heard it yet.