Palais Tara & Spa

The Palais Tara plays a card few medina riads can hold: that of the palace, in the plain sense. The house is classified 5-star, which stays rare inside the walls, and the decor follows. Hand-carved and painted cedar ceilings, sitting rooms opening onto the patio through tall glazed doors, coloured stained glass, marble floors, mother-of-pearl inlaid furniture: this is the grand Moroccan register, richly dressed, opposite the white and bare riads that dominate today. The central patio, with fountain, distributes about fifteen rooms, and welcome and cleanliness come top of the comments, on a meaningful review count.

The other strength of the house is that it covers the whole stay without you needing to step out. There are two water points, which is unusual in the medina: a heated pool on the terrace, with sun loungers and parasols and a rooftop view, and an indoor pool, sheltered. The spa rounds out the picture, with a vaulted hammam in blue and ochre zellige, a sauna and a steam room, and treatments on request. Add a Moroccan restaurant, a bar and a concierge service, in a hotel rather than guesthouse logic. The location is central without being noisy: five minutes on foot from Le Jardin Secret, about ten from Jemaa el-Fna and the Koutoubia.

What to know before booking mostly holds in the aesthetic stance and the price. The decor is dense, owned, old-style. Those after a contemporary, minimal, bare riad will land off-brief here. And while the house shows accessible entry rates for a 5-star, suites and high seasons climb noticeably, into the bracket of a standing address. As everywhere in the medina, finally, access goes through a derb where the taxi does not reach the door: better warn on arrival to be guided.

Few addresses gather in the medina a real 5-star, two pools and a full spa behind a derb door: that is the singularity of the Palais Tara. In return, you have to like a dense decor and accept that suites climb in high season. The register is clear from the first room, and the house holds it without pretence.