Palais Ronsard - Pool

Palais Ronsard in Marrakech sits on two hectares in the Palmeraie, about twenty minutes from the Medina. A Relais & Châteaux property, it was designed by decorator Gil Dez in an ornate mix of oriental, Andalusian, Napoleonic, and colonial styles that somehow holds together: the kind of interior where parakeet-coloured lampshades sit alongside hand-painted frescoes and Moroccan zellige, and the effect reads as considered rather than chaotic. The main pool occupies the centre of the property, long enough at over thirty metres to swim properly, heated year-round, and framed by colonnaded galleries that run along both sides. The columns give the pool a formal architectural weight that most Palmeraie hotel pools lack. Meals are served on the pool terrace through lunch, and loungers line the deck in the shade of the gallery or in open sun beyond it. The garden presses in on all sides: century-old olive trees, Pierre de Ronsard roses, bougainvillea, clipped hedges, fountains, lily ponds. Ground-floor rooms open directly onto this landscape, and the six separate pavilions hidden deeper in the garden each come with their own private pool and walled garden. Le Jardin d'Hiver, the main restaurant, won the Prix de Versailles in 2020 for most beautiful restaurant in the world. The interior matches the claim: crystal, velvet, frescoed walls, noble materials arranged with a precision that makes dinner feel staged in the best sense. The kitchen under Chef Alexandre Thomas works a fusion of Moroccan and French-Mediterranean, with ingredients drawn partly from the property's own organic potager. Lunch takes a lighter tone on the pool terrace or at Le Verger in the garden. Sunday brunch draws its own following. Day passes give non-guests access to the main pool with lunch included. The spa sits near the vegetable garden, 200 square metres opening onto roses and olive trees, with hammam, steam room, and double treatment rooms. Twenty-seven rooms and suites across the main building and garden pavilions are each decorated individually, with terraces or patios, fireplaces, and the kind of layered ornament that rewards a slow look around. Children under twelve are not admitted. Palais Ronsard treats the pool as the centre from which architecture, garden, and kitchen radiate outward, and the colonnaded galleries framing the water set a tone the rest of the property sustains.