Riad Brummell

The brainchild of Austrian hotelier Christian Schallert — the restless founder behind Brummell Projects — this five-room 19th-century palace near the Dar el Bacha and Jardin Secret is the real deal. Neoclassical Mauresque architecture dating to 1880, restored by Barcelona-based architect Claudia Raurell, with the original arcaded colonnades and sublime “waha o gayza” ceilings left gloriously intact. The traditional bones are dressed with a confident modern hand — tadelakt walls and hand-poured on-site terrazzo floors meet design icons like Egon Eiermann’s folding chairs, Marset’s Aura glass lamps, and the Italian 1960s classic Pipistrello on the rooftop. Art is everywhere: Manolo Menendez sculptures, brass and fiberglass works by the Bargamane brothers, Portuguese textile pieces lining the entrance hallway. A central patio courtyard with a water fountain pool, an ancient hammam on the mezzanine, and a rooftop plunge pool overlooking the medina complete the picture.

 For those wanting to disappear entirely, there’s the Annex House — a private four-bedroom sister property with its own plunge pool, two kitchens, and Atlas Mountain views. When you do eventually surface, the medina rewards the unhurried: duck into Soufiane Zarib’s carpet and ceramics shop through its tiny wooden door, browse the beautifully curated clothes and homeware at L’Atelier Michi just steps from Dar el Bacha, or lose an afternoon entirely at Moustapha Blaoui’s warehouse of ancient treasures up near Bab El Khemis. Adults-only, quietly confident, and possessed of the kind of effortless cool that can’t be manufactured.