Jacques Garcia's fondness for theatrical darkness — the lacquered walls, the Baccarat chandeliers, the velvet banquettes that seem to absorb candlelight rather than reflect it — finds perhaps its most unapologetic expression at Selman Marrakech, which opened in 2011 on the Chrifia plain south of the medina. The French designer, best known for reshaping the Hotel Costes in Paris, was given 40 hectares of palm grove and a brief that centred on the Arabian horse: the property was conceived as a palace for both guests and a resident herd of Arabians, whose stables and paddocks form part of the guest experience. The architecture by Garcia draws on Moroccan palace tradition — rose-tinted tadelakt plasterwork, carved plaster friezes, mashrabiya screens in dark-stained cedar — arranged around a central axis that culminates in a reflecting pool and formal garden visible from the upper terraces. The 57 rooms and suites are distributed across low-rise pavilions, their interiors ranging from saturated fuchsia velvet and zellige tile to burnished gold silk damask, each scheme carrying the maximalist confidence Garcia applies to all his commissions. The spa hammam, with its ribbed plaster vaulting and candlelit plunge pool, demonstrates how traditional Moroccan craft techniques can be pushed into something closer to stage design than restoration. The restaurant, hung with enormous crystal chandeliers above a circuit of crimson banquettes, maintains that same operatic register throughout.

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