After its independence from France in 1956, Morocco, and specifically Marrakech, the fourth largest of the historical Berber Empire's Imperial Cities, took off as a hippie mecca for artists (Andy Warhol), Hollywood starlets (Rita Hayworth), film directors (Alfred Hitchcock shot scenes for The Man Who Knew Too Much here) and the musical jet-set with The Beatles and the Rolling Stones enjoying rest and hazy 'relaxation' in the maze-like alleys of this medieval medina.
Into the eighties, and the expatriate arrivals and investment continued when Yves Saint Laurent bought the colonial Majorelle Garden (where his ashes are now buried). Meanwhile, Patrick Guerrand-Hermès – former cavalryman and great-great-grandson of the luxury brand's founder Thierry Hermès – bought Ain Kassimou, a late 19th century estate originally built for Leo Tolstoy's daughter Olga, which Guerrand-Hermès transformed into the Royal Polo Club de la Palmeraie with the help of the dapper, super-secretive and publicity averse American garden designer Madison Cox.
And now in the 21st century, Maroc is on a roll and the city is riding a renaissance as a destination for the in-crowd. Kate Moss? Check. Ralph Lauren? Check. The Delevingne clan? Check. Carine Roitfeld and Matthew Williamson doing karaoke at 3am? Check.
Isn't it time you joined them?
Fly
Flights from London to Marrakech begin at around £80 return British Airways from Stanstead Luton, Heathrow and Gatwick. You can also fly from other UK airports and most flights tend to be just under four hours long.
Where to stay in Marrakech: The best hotels
Staying near the Medina has its perks, but if you really want to get the best of both worlds while in Marrakesh, we’d recommend finding a dose of tranquillity at one of the resorts a bit further out. Our favourites for this? The Oberoi and Amanjena.
Set around a twenty minute drive from the city centre, The Oberoi is the epitome of a luxury spot, combining impressive architecture, open ceilings, large marble courtyards and walkways and some of the most picturesque gardens we’ve come across on our travels. You’re welcomed immediately by a central water feature which is adorned with a bright burning fire decoration, and the same level of opulence carries throughout the hotel.
Away from the main area, the majority of rooms give you plenty of privacy, set a short walk away and normally housed in their own private villas, some of which even include a private pool. In reality, there’s really no reason to ever leave your villa, and thanks to the in-room dining, you could technically enjoy a completely private escape, should that be what you’re after. The main pool still feels calm and isolated, with enough space that you never really feel near another group, and a poolside restaurant where you can get drinks or a casual lunch. For activities, you can also loan bikes, play on the clay tennis courts or head to the gym and spa complex for a treatment, yoga session or just to unwind with a view.
For dining, we’d definitely recommend trying Rivayat, one of the hotel’s restaurants that’s been created by Michelin-starred chef Rohit Ghai, serving some of the best Indian cuisine we’ve tried. The entire offering at the hotel is truly immaculate, but there’s also the option to head into the city thanks to the regular shuttle service that’ll drop you centrally. The hotel can also help you arrange taxis back at your leisure, and there’s plenty of knowledge and expertise from the concierge if you need a few recommendations or advice for where to go while you’re out and about.
It’s hard to quite capture the grandeur of The Oberoi in a few words, but it really is one of those places that you need to see to believe. Think five-star luxury, times that by ten, and then imagine even more opulence on top. Prepare for Morocco to be your new favourite destination if this is where you’ll be staying.
Amanjena
Aman hotels are now globally recognised as some of the leading travel resorts, but it's very much in line with a new wave of luxury that prioritises the experience and the service over any kind of flashy opulence. Each resort has been specifically tailored to its location, opting for designs influenced by the local culture and area to really help you feel immersed in your setting but in the most impressive way.
Around a twenty-minute drive from Marrakech city centre, Amanjena profers a sense of paradise, housing slightly fewer guests than other hotels nearby so it feels quieter and more private. From the moment you enter you’ll notice the magnificence of the building, one of the most impressive hotels we’ve come across, with sweeping lawns and gardens, expansive pools and water features, and restaurants and bars woven into the property so that it feels more like a home than a hotel. The rooms are all designed as small private villas with Berber carpets, tiled floors and high ceilings that really enhance the luxury feel of the stay. In many of them you’ll have your own private garden spot, with some even featuring private heated pools that let you really take in the landscape with views over the nearby golf course.
Around the property there’s plenty to keep you busy, whether you fancy a spa treatment, taking a dip in the pool, heading to the gym or playing a game of petanque or tennis, but one of the things that makes Amanjena stand out is the wealth of experiences on offer. Particularly impressive is the desert experience, easily the highlight of our entire trip to Marrakech, taking you out to the Agafay desert (just a 40 minute drive away) where you’ll be given the chance to ride camels or dirt bike, followed by a private dinner under the stars. Think local cuisine, traditional music and the chance to relax fireside. It's a definite must.
Whether you’re after an active holiday, one spent touring the city or one that just involves immersing yourself in a relaxing oasis, Amanjena has really got it all, creating the perfect luxury experience in a stunning location.
With hotels so perfect that the very words 'Mandarin Oriental' have become synonymous with unparalleled luxury, it should come as little surprise that this Marrakech edition would be one of the most spectacular residences in the city. Situated 20 minutes from Djemaa el-Fna (the city’s main square) this 50-acre property is a tranquil urban oasis. Marrying Mandarin Oriental’s signature paired-back style with local flourishes, the low-impact, terracotta buildings are nestled among palm, orange and olive trees, shimmering pools and fragrant gardens scented by more than 100,000 roses.
There’s a spa (complete, of course, with Moroccan hammam), three restaurants, two pools, and an astonishing array of activities on offer, not to mention the perfect-for-children petting zoo and the organic vegetable patch, from which the chefs take fresh ingredients from daily. Breakfast out on the veranda at Le Salon Berbère is a relaxed but civilised affair. Work your way through a pot of coffee or Moroccan tea and order a plate of Msamen (Morrocan pancakes), a decadent omelette or simply help yourself to the abundance of fresh fruit piled high on the marble tops. Come nightfall, stop again at Le Salon Berbère for an aperitif, where the vibe after dark is more champagne bar than breakfast. Dine at Ling Ling, the Chinese restaurant from the Hakkasan team, or head to Mes'Lalla, where the Moroccan menu with modern touches mirrors the wider Mandarin Oriental aesthetic.
While the stunning grounds, impressive facilities and top-tier service are all well worth noting, for GQ, it’s the pool villas that take this hotel from great to exceptional. The palatial villas (of which there are 54) are mind-blowingly beautiful. The Oriental Pool Villas centre around a private pool and spacious courtyard, with a jacuzzi, kitchen, sitting areas – including a fire pit, which the staff will happily light for you half an hour before you retire back to your villa – and then the indoor rooms all symmetrically placed around its rectangular circumference.
The two bedrooms are perfectly lovely, but it’s the master bathroom you’ll fantasise about for months after your stay. The grand circular bath takes pride of place, but the walk-in steam shower and the marble double sinks are impressive, too. The average hotel room could fit inside this bathroom comfortably. These two-bedroomed villas are perfect for two couples sharing or for a family, but if you’re travelling as a two, fear not. The Mandarin Pool villas are the same but with only one bedroom.
Mandarin Oriental, Route Golf Royal, Marrakech 40000, Morocco. +212 5242-98888, mandarinoriental.com/marrakech
La Mamounia
It’s impossible to imagine when entering the five-star La Mamounia’s magnificent gardens – where leaves twice as big as your head collide with vibrant flowers, and which have hosted the likes of Saint Laurent and Elton John – that the dust and riot of the souks is a mere five-minute walk away. In La Mamounia’s quiet, sheltered grounds (which contain over 1,200 plant species) with paths snaking through the foliage to who knows where, you can get lost at your leisure, with many activities to be enjoyed along the way: from playing a game of secluded ping pong one moment and jumping into the huge outdoor pool the next, before tending to one of the property’s many resident cats. This is a hotel for guests who have all the time in the world.
GQ recommends staying in one of the hotel’s impressive three-bedroom riads, ideal for holidaying couples or family. Equipped with a private kitchen and your own dedicated butler, the riad – complete with an outdoor pool and rooftop seating area with views over the gardens – offers the experience of a private hotel within a hotel. Upon arrival, a joyous spread of treats is laid out on the varnished tables in the dark, cosy sitting room with plush green-velvet sofas and fringed lamps. Graze on walnuts and Turkish delight, macaroons and sweet biscuits, along with honeyed milk in glass jugs, before trying to find the bedroom within the maze of wooden-panelled corridors leading to one door after another, each one bringing you first to a walk-in wardrobe, a second sitting room, or a third bathroom. You’ll lose your partner within moments, which can either feel like a liberating achievement or a right nuisance, depending on your mood.
After a buffet breakfast by the pool (try the frosted Pierre Hermé croissants), make a booking at La Mamounia spa: an intimate, silent cove of darkness where therapists go about their business in hushed whispers and you can barely see your feet on the ground. The one-hour massage is a must, followed by time spent in the sauna and steam room.
For dinner, and for one of the city’s most romantic experiences, it’s essential to sample traditional Moroccan cuisine with local produce from the vegetable garden at the hotel’s most authentic of its four restaurants, Le Marocain. Here, Berber musicians serenade you in your individual, curtained booths that protect you from neighbours’ spying eyes and the waiters who come and go. The pastilla stuffed with almonds and pigeon will make you contemplate moving to this heavenly city for good.
Avenue Bab Jdid، Marrakech 40040; mamounia.com
Royal Mansour
For all the five-star splendour that Marrakech has to offer, there is one scene-stealing city idyll more famous than all the rest. Built over more than three years by 1,200 craftsmen, the Royal Mansour is a pad quite literally fit for a king. Something of a pet project, the hotel was conceived of by King Mohammed VI of Morocco, and is used by his Majesty to host his own visitors. Located in the centre of the city, the Old Town’s high pink walls shroud the Royal Mansour fairytale from view, but inside it’s gates you’ll find a palace laid out in the style of a medina, centred around a jaw-droppingly beautiful, open-roofed foyer, with meandering pathways that wind from riad to riad. The smell of citrus wafts from the lemon and orange trees that line the walkways, while the tranquil trickling of water soundtracks every step.
Even the most modest of the 53 rooms are still three-floor riads. Step through the heavy wooden door and materialise, as if by magic, in an mosaic-tiled private courtyard, which leads onto a magnificent sitting room with carved cedar wood and beaten bronze. On the desk guests will find gold embossed personalised letterheads. Upstairs is the lavishly decorated bedroom, complete with the softest sheets GQ has ever slept in, and a marble bath big enough to swim in. Then at the top is the roof terrace and private plunge pool.
Every riad comes with its own butler, who uses the separate staff doors on each floor to slip in and out of the rooms unnoticed. These doors connect the labyrinthine tunnels and staff areas that keep the Royal Mansour a wonderfully discreet, well-oiled machine. Attention to detail is such at this hotel that the housekeeping staff literally brush the silk and suede rugs into straight-lined submission. Airport transfers are taken in one of the hotel’s two Bentleys, complete with a bilingual, astonishingly polite and proper white-gloved driver.
The food at the Royal Mansour is, of course, outstanding. There are three restaurants, a tea lounge, two bars and a fumoir. Breakfast outside in the gardens is a perfectly lovely affair, but the restaurant you’ll remember is La Grande Table Marocaine. Feast on traditional Moroccan dishes with Michelin-style flair as a Moroccan quartet play amid surroundings so ornate you’d be forgiven for thinking you’d walked onto a film set. Hidden among the Moorish gardens you’ll find the pool area and accompanying restaurant Le Jardin. Order a lemon sorbet mojito from one of the waiters – all wearing white fedoras – and kick back on the pillowy loungers, each lined with two gigantic, silky-soft towels.
Royal Mansour Marrakech, Rue Abou Abbas El Sebti، 40000, Morocco. +212 52980-8080, royalmansour.com
Villa Ezzahra
Marrakech may be known for its charming riads and luxurious hotels, but one of most serene and private ways to spend a week in this dusty paradise is to rent a villa. Villa Azzaytouna (Arabic for olive), is part of a three-villa estate owned by hotelier Brian Callaghan OBE in Palmeraie – a moneyed suburb just 20 minutes from the Medina. The 5,000 square-metered villa is a magical terracotta hideaway from the frenzy of Marrakech, and caters to Moroccan design with simple furnishings pepped up with finishing touches from the souks: from Berber benches to antique pots.
The house – which is catered for by the wonderful house manager Maria, as well as a private chauffeur and several chefs and waiters who will prepare each meal of the day – sleeps six in three spacious double bedrooms, each with its own outside courtyard. The two main bedrooms – kitted out with long Moroccan nightgowns and pointed orange leather slippers – have their own private plunge pool and large sunbed in the shade, as well as a giant indoor circular bathtub, which one can almost swim in.
Outside, amid the lavender and orange blossom, you’ll find a beautiful 12.8 metre pool with loungers and white and green Indian daybeds covered in cushions and topped with a straw sun hat, as well as a ping pong table for the restless.
The villa’s pièce de résistance is the sunken Berber tent: large enough to host a party for 30, yet cosy enough for intimate drinks between four. The cushioned seating, with blankets come dusk, is perfect for a sundowner and nibbles served by the villa’s staff, before enjoying a three course meal (featuring everything from chicken tagine to fresh fish and fruit) in the main dining room.
A few steps from the tent is the villa’s own private tiny spa, which offers unlimited 30-minute complimentary treatments for guests – from facials to manicures and massages. One therapist caters to groups of four or less, and two caters to groups of six. Bookings are made over a light buffet breakfast of fruit and classic Moroccan pancakes, as well as eggs on request.
Villa Ezzahra, Marrakesh 40016, ezzahra-morocco.com
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