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What is buzzing? In a city designated by his graceful nobles, the Palace Hotel is an icon of Madrid’s greatness. The Spanish capital has been formed over the centuries by kings and ducats, generals and cardinals. But the 112-year-old palace has just had a arrangement created to highlight another side of the city: its history of art and avant-garde literature.
The building is a 470 -room metropolitan giant. It was the first hotel in Spain to boast of the Bathroom en-suite. The renovation of € 90m was to restore his soul. In her revitalized heart is a cube of art, with light pouring through her stained glass, rising up over a circular ribbon placed in a winter garden. During the dark days of the Spanish civil war, the hotel served as a hospital and this area was its operating theater. But during Madrid’s movement, A great countercultural movement that emerged after the death of dictator Francisco Franco was a place for the legendary parties.
Its renewal implies a step of the fantasy scale. The old pragmatic hotel Westin Palace – directed under exclusivity by Marriott – emerged excellent last week as a new member of the luxury collection of the same group.
Location, Location, Location The palace is as central as a Madrid institution can get. She sits in a corner of Paseo Del Prado all -inclusive, one of Europe’s first urban walks, and in front of her great rival, Ritz Mandari Oriental Ritz, a more aristocratic country. Although you don’t hear a lot Madrid Use the phrase, the tourism industry calls this city stretch Landscape – Landscape of light – and it contains a stunning concentration of art and nature. The palace is only a few minutes of walks from three brilliant Madrid art museums, as well as the least visible headquarters of the army and the Navy and a group of ministries. Nearby are botanical gardens and Manicured Retiro park, a wonderful exception in a city that tends to have more concrete affinity than trees.
Checking in The guests walk through the giant archive of the palace in an airy atrium of the old world of roasted brown marble and wood panel. A chandelier hangs above and the control tables are discreetly placed on the walls from both sides. It feels more or less like arrival in the early 1900s – and that’s the point. The renovators wanted to restore the environment they saw in the black and white hotel photographs when it was opened. They began arranging in June 2023 and managed to keep the business open all over.
The presence of the owner of the palace, Archer Hotel Capital, is marked only with a small regulatory notice. Otherwise the walls are decorated with works of art. There are medieval Flemish upholstery downstairs. And up, the green and imprisoned corridors are lined with paintings shocked by the interior stylist Lázaro Rosa-Violán, inspired by the regulations of the past hotel, including Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dalí. In the old carpets old carpets are stripped. Now nature is abundant, whether in the wall lights with gold bellent leafy, forest tapestry on the heads of bed, or a vintage botanical poster painted on the floor tiles up to the ceiling. Renewal even means that towels have plumper.
What to do? The top of the lists of many visitors are three museums of the “Golden Art Triangle”: Prado, Reina Sofía and Thyssen-Bornemisza. For second -hand books, visitors can browse at home stables at home that line up Cesta de Moyano, and for a wilder store has the Flea Rastro market on Sundays. The palace runs the tournament in Las las labjeThe literary trimester, whose ways returning to the 16th century, contrasting the Paris-style streets that came later. Flancis and opera shows in real theaters are also popular. And in this 20-minute city, where a taxi can take you almost anywhere at the time, it is easy to visit the reconstructed stadium, similar to the ship, similar to the Real Madrid ship. The match tickets are more difficult to get, but ask the goalkeeper.
What about food and drink? The grass under the cubes is also the dining room, which provides a bubble belief at the time of the meal. The food is Spanish, but one step forward from the classic tavern tariff. Our lek with Romesco sauce and roasted onions was as thin as Tuna Tartar with caviar. A pork fillet served with Puree Apple had only the right durability, but an Entrecôte Humdrum was fiercely disappointed.
A drink alternative is the 27th Palace’s club-a Speakeasy-style grass named for the 1927 generation, a group of Bohemian poets who frequented the hotel, among them Federico García Lorca, Vicente Aleixandre and Luis Cernuda. It serves a “Hemingway” Negron and is as comfortable as a library of manor houses, but unfortunately it was not isolated from dancing music by jumping out of the hotel sound system.
Other guests Americans with high rotation prevail. They make up 40-50 percent of guests in the palace and other city hotels, including young couples, retirees and business people treating their leisure time on their work trips. In the rush of the lobby on a last Saturday evening, American Gens in Dad jeans and comfortable brushed shoulders with Spanish guests go to a wedding reception, the immaculate women who wear comprehensive dresses and flowers in their hair.
DAMAGE The king’s bedrooms begin with 550 €. The suites are 2,200 € or more.
Elevator Boho Luxe with an artsy twist.
Barney Jopson was a guest of Palace Hotel Madrid (Marriott.com). He is the Correspondent of Spain and Portugal of FT, based in Madrid
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