At Reykjavík's Old Harbour, where fishing trawlers and whale-watching vessels still come and go against a backdrop of snow-capped Esja, a pair of dark-clad towers clad in charred timber-effect panels and blackened concrete rise with a quiet authority that feels genuinely Icelandic rather than imported. The Reykjavik EDITION opened in 2021, designed by architect Bassi Carriers with interiors overseen by Ian Schrager's team, and the 253-room property earns its place on the waterfront by taking its material cues from the surrounding landscape rather than ignoring it. Inside, the approach shifts from Nordic severity to something warmer and more eclectic. Guest rooms carry the signature EDITION palette — oak headboards, textured grasscloth wall coverings, and striped wool throw blankets in earthy ochres and rusts that reference the volcanic geology visible through the floor-to-ceiling harbour windows — while midcentury lounge chairs in sculpted walnut add a quietly Scandinavian note. The restaurant is the most architecturally resolved space: a coffered oak ceiling of deep interlocking beams creates a structural canopy above a central octagonal marble bar, flanked by illuminated wine walls and banquettes upholstered in teal. A rooftop terrace furnished with cast-iron bistro chairs faces directly toward Faxaflói Bay, the Snæfellsnes peninsula visible on clear evenings — a view that makes the architecture's restraint feel exactly right.

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