Royal Mansour Marrakech, Morocco Is One Of The World’s Greatest Hotels

Morocco is hot, and tourism has been booming in recent years, with this summer up 20% over the same period last year. If you go to Morrocco, it's a big country with a lot to see and do, but you're very likely to visit Marrakech, the nation's most popular tourist destination, and one where visitation is up significantly over last year. To make this more appealing, United Airlines just announced the launch of the first ever non-stop from the U.S. to Marrakech, from Newark, which started last month (Royal Air Maroc flies to Casablanca). And when you get there, if you can, you want to stay at the Royal Mansour , not just the top chocie in Marrakech, but one of the world's best hotels.

The Palace of The King

Many hotels brag about the heads of state, Presidents, Prime Minsters or royalty who have chosen to stay there, but the Royal Mansour takes this a step further—it was conceived, built, and is owned by the King of Morocco, and it's always good to be king. It's also good to stay as a guest at the king's hotel, especially when no expense has been spared to make the accommodations ultra-luxurious yet very, very comfortable, the food unrivalled in the city, and the service unrivalled pretty much anywhere. The attentive staff here outnumbers the room count by more than ten to one.

Rave Reviews

It's one of only two Forbes 5-Star hotels in the entire country (the two new Royal Mansour satellite locations in Casablanca and the beach resort of Tamuda Bay have not been rated yet, but are also extremely impressive). Luxury travel agency Indagare put out its Indagare Adored List of the top 175 luxury properties in the world, and wrote, "Le Royal Mansour is the King of Morocco's personal passion project and the most expensive and extravagant hotel in Marrakech."

Chad Clark, one of the world's top luxury travel advisors, founder of Chad Clark Travel Ventures in Phoenix, a member of luxury travel consortium Virtuoso, goes further and ranks it as one of his "Seven Summit" hotels, the seven best properties on the entire planet. "It's just on a whole another level, even from the other luxury hotels in Marrakech."

Before I went I listened to an informative series of travel podcasts from a top Moroccan tour operator, Destination Morocco , and in their episode on the country's best hotels, they said the same thing, pointing out that while the country is home to hundreds of top brand international luxury hotels (just in Marrakech, there is Mandarin Oriental, Nobu, Fairmont, Aman, Oberoi, Four Seasons, and more), in both Marrakech and Casablanca, the Royal Mansour hotels were on an entirely different level.

My favorite newspaper travel section, the Telegraph, which does the best in-depth international hotel reviews, says "The magnificent Royal Mansour is the gold standard of luxury hotels in Marrakech, offering impeccable, gracious service and facilities second to none." They rightly give it perfect 10s for location, service and food, and note of the design, "As the King's own hotel, the Royal Mansour is an ode to Moroccan craftsmanship and hospitality. Everything here is the very best version of itself, and every inch of the place displays the country's finest crafts, from walls of shimmering zellij (geometric mosaic) to ceilings of scented cedarwood and patios covered in intricate stuccowork that climbs the walls like floral creepers. Likewise, rooms are sumptuously furnished with rock crystal lamps, silver inlaid tables, engraved glass screens, thick silk carpets, handloomed damask and jacquard curtains, and chandeliers by Baccarat. It is a virtuous display of Morocco's love of material, pattern and texture and the resulting effect is dazzling, but also strangely cosy."

I've stayed in many of the hotels around the world routinely rated among the very best, Top 10, Top 50, etc., and I was still very impressed with the Royal Mansour—despite going with unbelievably high expectations, which usually is something that does not pan out.

The Details

What did I like so much? For starters, the location is perfect, sitting in a park-like 15-acre walled oasis that straddles the border between the Medina, Marrakech's walled Old City, and the hippest most upscale neighborhood of the surrounding New City to the northwest of the Medina. Everyone who goes to Marrakech wants to see its famously lively main square full of snake charmers, monkey handlers, fortune tellers and food stalls, the Jemaa el-Fnaa, and the narrow alleys of artisan shops and spice traders surrounding it, the souks, but this is not really where you want to stay. Many of the nicer hotels within the Medina cannot even be reached by car or taxi.

But the top sites, the souks and the square, are walkable from the Royal Mansour in 5-10 minutes, easy, and they'll even drive you to the gate at the end of their expansive entry drive in a golf cart to cut the walk short.

Turn the other way, and in minutes you are at the city's biggest shopping mall, some of its most famous boutiques, and heralded trendy restaurants. To hit the city's most popular tourist sites outside the Medina, the famed Majorelle Gardens and YSL Museum, you just jump in a cab at the hotel and are there in no time, without navigating the maze of small, crowded roads.

Convenience is a big thing here, and in fact, the allure of the Royal Mansour begins well before you arrive, the minute you step off the plane. Despite a beautiful and relatively new airport, the booming tourism trade has made Marrakech a victim of its own success, and two to three hour waits at immigration are not uncommon. But as the King's guest, you can be met at the jet bridge and whisked through immigration and customs and be at baggage claim in five minutes. When my bags came off the carousel, not a single other passenger from our flight, including those in business class, had arrived yet. Then it is into one of the hotel's Bentleys for the very short ten-minute drive to the hotel. Upon departure the hotel can also arrange VIP access to skip the long lines—the concierge advised us to leave just 90 minutes before our international flight home, a luxury in this day and age, and it was plenty of time.

The location is great, but so is the property itself. The lobby, the restaurants, the spa, the accommodations and pool are laid out among gorgeously landscaped lush gardens and palm trees, extremely unusual for an urban property that sits in the middle of a bustling city. Accommodations are as luxurious as they come and there are no "regular rooms," as all of the lodging is in 53 individual modern riads.

Riads are Morocco's traditional style of homes for the wealthy and powerful. essentially villas or mansions, and many old original riads around the country have been turned into boutique hotels. The key design elements of a riad are an open-air central garden courtyard with fountain and elaborate tile work on the ground floor, surrounded by living areas. Bedrooms are upstairs, and there is usually a rooftop terrace, with indoor and outdoor spaces flowing from one to another. Every accommodation at the Royal Mansour is a modern "townhouse-style" take on a riad, with a ground floor entryway with fountain, living and sitting room, and outdoor private garden terrace, then bedroom or bedrooms above and a rooftop terrace—all of which have plunge pools.

These come in one-, two- and three-bedroom configurations, plus the nearly 20,000 square foot Grand Riad, with a two-level roof terrace, full swimming pool in the garden and a second pool on the roof, plus home cinema and gym.

The smallest riad is 1,500 square feet, and on each floor of every riad there is a discreet service entrance for staff, and given the great selection of venues, room service is very popular here, especially breakfast, which can be served on the roof, in the garden or in the sitting room. Whatever you order, from tea to food to bell service, it comes astonishingly quickly and efficiently, and much of the service infrastructure, including tunnels to the riads, is hidden underground. There's a definite "your wish is our command" vibe here.

The "rooms" are amazing, though some critics have complained about the stairs and verticality of the design. To me its pat of the authenticity of design, and millions of dollars have been spent in pursuit of authentic deign and amazing Moroccan craftsmanship. Some 1,200 craftsmen worked to make the hotel the stunning tribute to all things Morocco that it is today. But to address this concern, the hotel has been quietly retrofitting elevators into the riads, so if this is an issue for you that's something to inquire about.

The entire property has this over the top, nothing is spared design aesthetic, and it's a very easy place to spend the day and not leave. The spa is absolutely world class, huge with a wide range of both "conventional" treatments and Moroccan specialties such as hammam. There's a state-of-the-art fitness center and indoor pool here as well. The outdoor pool is set in the gardens, and is huge for the number of guests, with lots of cabanas and covered chaises. A special touch is the artist atelier, where you can take classes in painting, pottery or other crafts, and most recently, the hotel built an unbelievable gourmet teaching kitchen to host private cooking classes. You can do French pastry, but we chose the traditional Moroccan class and learned to make one of the nation's most beloved dishes, chicken tajine with olives and preserved lemon, plus some traditional appetizers. Then we enjoyed it all as our private lunch. Just a fantastic experience, and a deeper dive into why we went to Morocco in the first place.

Culinary Excellence

But even if you don't cook for yourself, food is front and center at Royal Mansour, which has—by far—the best collection of fine dining of any hotel in the country. Ther are seven dining options, and the fine dining La Grande Table Marocaine is widely regarded as the nation's premier Moroccan restaurant (they also opened an outpost of the eatery in the brand-new Royal Mansour Casablanca).

Both La Grande Table Marocaine and La Grande Brasserie, an all-day contemporary French brasserie, are overseen by Michelin-starred French chef Helene Darroze. The Italian spot, SESAMO, is run by three-star Michelin chef Massimiliano Alajmo. There's Le Jardin, an Asian-inspired gastronomic restaurant that true to its name is set out in the garden near the pool, the Main Bar cocktail bar and lounge, the Fireplace Lounge, overlooking the gardens with live piano music, and the Cigar Bar, with small bites such as caviar and foie gras, one of the deepest wine, champagne, rum and whisky lists in Morocco—and Cuban cigars.

Talk to anyone who has been to this hotel, and you will hear the word "service," because the phenomenally high number of employees combines with Morocco's famous hospitality culture to insure attention to your needs, and nowhere is this illustrated more than in the fine dining eateries where teams of servers make sure that no water or wine glass goes empty. To enjoy the finest in traditional Moroccan dishes at their highest level, like the seafood pastilla, a festive dish normally served at wedding celebrations, a signature entree for two here, you simply must experience La Grande Table Marocaine. But if like many visitors you have tajines and cous cous day in and day out and are ready for a change, you would be hard pressed to find better Italian or French food in the city. The hotel restaurants are open to outsiders, and are very popular, so even if you don't stay at Royal Mansour—which would be shame—you can still get a taste of its greatness.