Riad Smara

Forty steps down Derb Ferrane, Riad Smara sits behind an unmarked cedar door in Arset El Houta, a residential pocket of the Medina north of Jemaa el-Fna. Its courtyard keeps the original tadelakt walls and a working fountain, cooling upper rooms even in July.

Rooms open onto the courtyard rather than a corridor, so light and mint-tea scent from the ground-floor kitchen reach every floor. Staff will arrange a guide through the souks, since the riad itself carries no street signage.

The Bahia Palace is a twelve-minute walk east, past the tanneries' edge.