Riad El Fenn, Marrakech, Morocco

Just five minutes walking distance from Marrakech’s main square, the Riad el Fenn is a luxury riad which manages to shut out all the sound of the bustling medina -its ancient walls are over a metre thick.

The facilities

While the architecture and textiles at this luxury riad are quintessentially Moroccan, the bold coloured walls, modern furnishings and contemporary artwork make Riad el Fenn refreshingly hip. The museum-quality artwork includes original modern works by Bridget Riley, Antony Gormley, Frances Upritchard and Fiona Rae among others. Keeping up the exotic feel, Riad El Fenn has its own tortoises, as well as a chameleon and iguana which all can be seen striking poses in the courtyard.

There is also a fully equipped spa facility, including two resident estheticians, two massage treatment rooms and a four person hammam. Also, the luxury riad has two marble pools with jet streams for counter current swimming. For movie buffs, a private screening room with a digital projector is available for cinema-style DVD watching.

All of the organic food served is sourced locally from the luxury riad’s garden at the foothills of the Atlas Mountains. Simple lunches usually include a modern Moroccan menu of salads, vegetables, fish or chicken, with cheese and dessert. Dinner is much heavier and sophisticated, and changes depending on the seasonal produce offered at local markets. The kitchen also offers cooking lessons to guests wanting insight how to recreate the delicious cuisine.

The rooms

All 11 rooms at this luxury riad are spacious, with high ceilings, a sitting area, six-foot-wide beds, Egyptian cotton bed linen, deep custom-built tadlakt baths, powerful showers and in most cases an open-plan bathroom. The fine linen, scented candles and a huge array of coloured babouche slippers make the each room particularly comfortable.

Carved wooden doors, ornate metal jalousies, antique mirrors and faded rugs offset the modernism with traditional Moroccan essentials. Three guest rooms look onto the courtyard, two of them are in a more private colonnade while the grand Douiria suite is a two-storey apartment with a private roof terrace and its own plunge pool.