The Kasbah is the medina in a quieter key: the southern quarter, behind its own ramparts, around the Saadian Tombs and the Badi palace, off the flow of Jemaa el-Fna. You sleep inside the walls as in the medina, with fewer people at the gates and the great monuments two steps away. The trade-off: lodging is scarce here, and access follows the old-town rule - taxi to the mouth of the derb, then on foot. For wider choice in the same walls, the neighbouring medina has plenty more.
Five rooms, bare tadelakt, potted cacti and olive trees on the roof: the Riad Solange is a small Kasbah house turned to wellness more than to the postcard. Yoga several times a week, sound baths, home-made table, and a hostess who receives as she would like to be received. No pool, but a bubble to settle in.
At under forty pounds a night, the Riad Miss Caracal puts everything on its roof: daybeds, cacti, straw parasols and a hot tub facing the Kasbah rooftops. Five plain rooms below, two hosts travellers adore, and one of the best welcomes of the quarter.
Reopened in early 2025 after refurbishment, the Riad Farasha is a small four-room riad, fresh and quiet, a six-minute walk from the Saadian Tombs. A dipping basin at the back of the patio, a terrace overlooking the Kasbah rooftops, and a name that means butterfly.
Macassar ebony columns, tubular 1930s armchairs, shagreen and parchment: the Villa Makassar is not another Moroccan riad, it is an Art Deco palace, the only one of its kind in the medina. Ten rooms, each dedicated to an artist of the period, in the Kasbah, a ten-minute walk from Jemaa el-Fna.
The Palais Calipau stands out first for its size: a dozen rooms around an orange-tree patio where a real pool takes the centre, two tables, a spa. A hundred and fifty metres from the Saadian Tombs, it is one of the busiest houses in the south medina, anything but a pocket address.
At two hundred and fifty metres from the Saadian Tombs, the Riad Merzouga is a family Kasbah house: seven rooms in frank colours around a patio basin, a rooftop terrace. Its name says its other calling, because from here depart the tours to the desert dunes.
Behind a Kasbah wall lies what the medina rarely delivers: a three-thousand-square-metre garden, planted with orange trees, around a heated pool. Les Jardins de la Médina occupy a former palace turned into a thirty-six-room hotel, minutes from the Saadian Tombs. A green oasis in the old town, for anyone wanting space without leaving the walls.
The Riad Louhou has chosen white where the Kasbah plays zellige: pristine patio, mashrabiya, driftwood, linen and rattan. Five suites only, a hammam, a basin on the roof and a real table, a ten-minute walk from Jemaa el-Fna.
Six rooms behind a medina door, in the kasbah quarter, two minutes from the Saadian Tombs. The Riad Awa has set its pool on the roof, at the foot of the kasbah mosque minaret, and keeps on the ground floor a big white patio and a hammam. You come here for the terrace and the address, not for the rooms, which stay modest.
