St Regis Grand, Rome, Italy

If anywhere can outdo the sumptuous revamp of the Westin Excelsior, it’s the luxury hotel St Regis Grand, from the same Starwood stable. ‘A legend is reborn, a fable is renewed’ crows the lavish press pack with a sheaf of transparencies and cuttings from every fashion magazine on earth. Presumably it was this sort of thing that prompted the Barbarians to help themselves all those years ago, and it seems somehow apt that the St Regis should be just a few paces from the massive half-smashed remains of a great Roman Basilica, now Santa Maria Maggiore.

The facilities

Reception of this luxury hotel is discreetly off to the right, as if embarrassed of Mammon. Downstairs the main hall is stunningly restored in ornate French Empire style with dark marble floors, red velvet furnishings, antiqued yellow-gold walls, one huge and other smaller chandeliers. Potted plants and impressive flower arrangements add to the effect, and lead into the magnificently frescoed Ritz room. Everyone says hello.

The rooms

An ancient wrought iron lift takes one up to wide wide corridors, marble floored with framed engravings. Every room in the luxury hotel has a name – and a fresco – with stuccoed or stenciled walls, swagged curtains and tastefully arranged furniture. You literally sink into them and once there won’t want to move, barbarians or no. A few rooms have balconies, with the tallest windows on the first and second floors. There’s no pool, just a small sweaty fitness center in the eaves. Stay in the bath.