\n\tAward: Best for palatial style<\/p>\n
\n\tWith its grand staircases, gilded ceilings, and parlor palms, Barcelona\u2019s original luxury haunt first opened in 1919 as the Ritz hotel on one of the city\u2019s major avenues. Since then it has hosted everyone from Salvador Dal\u00ed and the Rolling Stones\u2019 Ronnie Wood\u2014both of whom have Suites named after them\u2014to Pablo Picasso, Frank Sinatra, John Wayne, Sofia Loren, Michael Douglas, and Pierce Brosnan.<\/p>\n
\n\tIn 2005 it was reborn as El Palace and has undergone numerous revamps since then, so it\u2019s not at all fusty. The 114 rooms, including 24 junior suites, six superior suites, and five deluxe suites, feature lofty ceilings and marble bathrooms. For truly palatial style, the six Art Suites\u2014including Salvador Dali\u2019s favorite and another designed by Ronnie Wood\u2014have grand fireplaces, vast walk-in closets, and Roman-style mosaic tubs.<\/p>\n
\n\tDining options include the superb Amar, as well as a large rooftop terrace with a restaurant, garden, and pool. At the award-winning\u00a0Mayan spa\u00a0on the first floor, you can indulge in stress-banishing massages using volcanic rocks and medicinal herbs.\u00a0The hotel also has its own luxury speedboat if you fancy\u00a0seeing the Barcelona skyline from the water. Choose from a day out on the\u00a0SeaRay\u00a0SDX 270 or savor a three-hour sunset cruise with a bottle of Ruinart or Brut Reserve cava.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tBest amenity: The hotel\u2019s Amar restaurant is run by Rafa Zafra, a former chef at Ferran Adria\u2019s legendary three-Michelin-starred El Bulli\u2014five times voted the World\u2019s Best Restaurant. Sample seafood in the grand midnight-blue dining room.<\/p>\n
\n\tCan\u2019t-miss experience: Named after Ronnie Wood, the Bluesman Cocktail Bar in the hotel\u2019s basement is all red velvet, leather chesterfields, and 1920s chandeliers. Come for the top cocktails and a boogie (or the adjacent cigar cellar with humidors) and you might just run into a Rolling Stone. <\/p>\n
\n\tFrom $490<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Award: Best for palatial style With its grand staircases, gilded ceilings, and parlor palms, Barcelona\u2019s original luxury haunt…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18669,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[92,10259,7468,7680,17],"class_list":["post-18668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barcelona","tag-barcelona","tag-best-of","tag-feature","tag-hotels","tag-spain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18668\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}