Top 10: the best honeymoon hotels in Marrakech
An insider's guide to the top honeymoon hotels in Marrakech, including the best for five-star service, manicured gardens, Moroccan-style bedrooms, courtyard pools, exceptional breakfasts, rooftop restaurants and romantic bars, in locations near the Medina and Jemaa El Fna square.
La Mamounia
Marrakech, Morocco
8Telegraph expert rating
La Mamounia is a characterful hotel offering lovely walled gardens, a choice of four restaurants, fabulous breakfasts and Moroccan style rooms, near the Medina and Jemaa El Fna square. Immaculate door staff in traditional robes set high standards. One of the five bars is named after Churchill who regularly wintered here. The outdoor pool is larger and busier than the indoor one which is located next to a basement spa area offering treatments based on local products including argan oil, orange-flower water and honey. Decorated in Moroccan style, rooms have intricately-patterned wall tiles, internal lattice-wood screens, large gilded mirrors and colourful mosaic-tiled floors. Large picture windows lead onto private terraces. Read expert review From £395per night Check availability Rates provided by Mr & Mrs Smith
• The best riad hotels in Marrakech
Royal Mansour Marrakech
Marrakech, Morocco
9Telegraph expert rating
The gold standard of luxury hotels in Marrakech, the Mansour was commissioned by King Mohammed VI, who often hosts his guests in its 53 private riads, which are situated in almost four hectares of fragrant Moorish gardens. Privacy is at a premium here where even staff scurry between salon, pool and private patio via a network of subterranean passages. Above ground, opulence is the name of the game. Rooms are strewn with suede and silk carpets, velvet brocade sofas and crystal do-dads and chandeliers from Lalique, Baccarat and Venice. It also has the most beautiful hammam and spa in Marrakech. Read expert review From £934per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• The most romantic hotels in Marrakech
L'Hôtel Marrakech
Marrakech, Morocco
9Telegraph expert rating
Jasper Conran’s 19th-century riad is a haven of effortless good taste. Its extravagant green garden and art-filled suites channel the same soignée glamour as the 1942 film, Casablanca. With just five suites, staying here feels like visiting a beautiful private home, which is exactly what a riad is meant to be. Tangier and Asilah are the smallest suites, while Zagora, Fez and Casablanca run the whole width of the house, each with its own private terrace or balcony. All rooms have romantic, four-poster beds swathed in romantic voile drapery, and are furnished with artworks from Jasper’s collection including glittering Indian miniature paintings, elaborate, inlaid Syrian mirrors and organic Art Deco lamps by Daum Frères. Read expert review From £261per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• The best Marrakech hotels in the medina
Villa des Orangers
Marrakech, Morocco
9Telegraph expert rating
Sipping mint tea while songbirds tweet sweetly amid the orange blossom is the real luxury of this 27-room riad. Push through the carved wooden door into the citrus scented garden and you could be forgiven for thinking you had chanced upon a secret royal palace. Water gurgles soothingly off a fountain and olives and palms frame intricately carved plaster archways, which shade inviting porticos. In the centre, reflecting the sky, is a mirror-like pool lined by immaculate white-cushioned loungers. Inside, a clubby, French-colonial style keeps things luxurious but intimate from the wood-pannelled dining room to the ample leather sofas in the cigar cellar. The bedrooms overlook one of the courtyards and most have balconies or private terraces. Read expert review From £354per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• The best boutique hotels in Marrakech
Mandarin Oriental, Marrakech
Marrakech, Morocco
10Telegraph expert rating
The Mandarin’s debut African resort is as subtle and stylish as you’d expect from one of the world’s leading luxury hoteliers. Unlike the recent trend of ever more ostentation in Marrakech’s five star hotels, the Mandarin’s luxury doesn’t shout, it whispers. The 54, single-storey villas and central hub nestle unobtrusively in a fully mature garden that undulates like a dunefield and is planted loosely with feathery grasses and punctuated by centuries-old olive trees. Inside there is a similarly strong, but subtle sense of place. In total there are 54 villas, seven first-floor suites and two spa suites and all the rooms have private pools and acres of space. Read expert review From £734per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• The best budget hotels in Marrakech
Riad Adore
Marrakech, Morocco
9Telegraph expert rating
The original courtyard columns and arches remain, but the house was finished with pale sand coloured tadelakt, creamy plaster and oyster grey paintwork on the moshrabia (hand turned wooden screens) giving it a serene, almost beachy feel. It’s enhanced by added extras like a fantastically cool aquamarine, courtyard plunge pool, a pint-sized hammam where you can drift off to a dreamy ‘gommage’ (scrub down with olive oil soap infused with rose water) or chill in a library well-stocked with books, lifestyle mags and films. All rooms are bright and immaculately appointed, but opt for the airy Victoria Suite where you can sit out on the balcony over the pool and luxuriate over a long lazy breakfast before sneaking back beneath your high-cotton count, embroidered bed linens. Read expert review From £112per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• The best five-star hotels in Marrakech
Riad de Tarabel
Marrakech, Morocco
8Telegraph expert rating
The riad revolves around a large central courtyard with six orange trees standing like sentries on a manicured green lawn that looks all the more vibrant for the charcoal grey walkway that surrounds it. Like a Delacroix painting there’s a dramatic use of lighting, colour and romance in the décor which combines colonial and Second Empire furnishings to opulent effect. The secondary pool patio is dotted with commodious wicker loungers and features a charming orangery-cum-bar lined with a fabulous Zuber hand-printed mural. The 10 large rooms and suites sport the same moody, romantic, turn-of-the-century vibe with charcoal-grey shutters, black lacquered furniture and graphic floor tiles offset by sparkling chandeliers. Read expert review From £184per night Check availability Rates provided by Mr & Mrs Smith
• The best Marrakech spa hotels
Jnane Tamsna
Marrakech, Morocco
8Telegraph expert rating
Moorish arches frame views of the organic gardens, and shed light on co-owner Meryanne Loum-Martin's extensive contemporary African art collection. Here, chiselled good looks in cream stucco and dark wood provide glamour without the gilt. Repurposed antiques and fair-trade, artisan-made furnishings set the standard for sustainable African chic. Rooms are light and airy rather than cavernous, with African textiles spread across generous beds and cushioned reading nooks. Main house bedrooms offer comparable casual elegance to villa suites, which feature bigger bathrooms and more privacy. Dinners in the salon or on a private terrace make the most of sun-ripe vegetables and pungent herbs plucked moments before in the organic gardens. Read expert review From £126per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• Where to stay in Marrakech: hotels by district
Riad Joya
Marrakech, Morocco
9Telegraph expert rating
Taking its cue from ancient Rome, Greece and the Maghreb, Riad Joya’s grand architecture impresses against a desert palette of sand, taupe and beige. The effect is a cocoon of subtle style where luxury whispers at you from every detail of the bespoke furnishings which are fashioned in cedar, bronze, linen, silk and velvet. The suites' design takes its lead from the blend of civilisations that have left their imprint on Morocco from the gold accents of the Ottoman Suite to the indigo detailing of the Tuareg Suite. As you’d expect every comfort has also been considered, particularly the fabulously comfortable bespoke beds. Read expert review From £197per night Check availability Rates provided by Booking.com
• The best luxury hotels and riads in Marrakech
Riad Mena & Beyond
Marrakech, Morocco
9Telegraph expert rating
Riad Mena exhibits the same clever, contemporary, cosmopolitan style as its globetrotting owner Philomena Schurer Merckoll. Working with designer Romain Michel Meniere the handsome 19th-century house was nipped and tucked to create an easy sense of flow from the garden courtyard through to the pool patio, then up via multiple staircases to a romantic curtain-screened loggia and a jigsaw of terraces furnished with flowers, sofabeds and sun loungers shaded by jaunty yellow parasols. In places it channels a Miami-in-Marrakech vibe – signature mid-century modern pieces sit easily on vintage kilims beside embroidered leather pouffes hung with cowrie shells. Talitha Getty and the kaftan crowd of Sixties ‘Kech’ would feel right at home here, and so will you. Read expert review From £163per night
