Skip the five stars and do what the locals - and Mick Jagger - do in Morocco. Find a Riad.
There aren’t many places to visit in which it’s best not to stay in a fancy hotel. Marrakech is one of them. When the artsy counter culture crowd of the 1960s first ‘discovered’ Morocco - and more specifically its ancient tourist capital Marrakech - the thing to do was to stay in a Riad, the characteristic urban architectural form of the country dating back centuries.
That’s what Jimi Hendrix, Talitha Getty, The Rolling Stones and Alfred Hitchcock did - while filming ‘The Man Who Knew Too Much’ here. It’s what The Beatles and Yves Saint Laurent did, the latter falling in love with the now 962-year-old city such that he and partner Pierre Berge moved here, developing their own spectacular walled gardens, now next to the Yves Saint Laurent Museum. OK, so this in part, was because corporate tourism had yet to make its mark: But they had the right idea. Staying in a riad is what you should do too.
A kind of multi-level townhouse, traditionally built around an interior garden with trees and fountain, open to the sky - so expect birds to come visiting - a Riad gives what still today feels like a literal oasis of calm and cool, given the exhilarating/overwhelming constant noise, heat and bustle outside. So packed is the heart of Marrakech that riads typically have a small footprint and no or few windows onto the outside world, allowing them to be built up against each other on three sides.
On floors above you’ll find a simple bathroom - historically the practice was to wash not at home but at local hammams, though today most of course come with showers - with bedrooms typically doorless in favour of textile covers that let the air circulate. All face onto an interior garden. Up and up some more until you reach your open-top roof terrace.
Better than a swanky hotel though? Sure, nobody is going to bring a glass of Moroccan wine to your lounger. You’ll have to pour that yourself - and, this being a dry country, you’ll have to find it first too. But given even a more humble Riad’s abundant space, history and authenticity - one reason why so many have been bought by foreigners over the last couple of decades, in something of a gold rush - these Moorish mini-palaces are luxurious, and all the more so given the price.
A Riad places you at the centre of the action - there’s not a tourist spot in Marrakesh that isn’t walkable or a short if sometimes hair-raising taxi ride from the Medina - for several nights for the price of a room for one night in an upscale hotel. And that’s not the kind of deal you get anywhere else.
