On Rabat's Atlantic shore, an 18th-century sultan's summer palace has found its most compelling chapter yet. Four Seasons Hotel Rabat at Kasr Al Bahr — Arabic for "Palace by the Sea" — spreads across five hectares where palm and citrus trees shade 11 buildings, six of them dating to 1792 when Sultan Moulay Slimane commissioned his seaside retreat. The landmark reopened in autumn 2024, its Moorish domed rooftops, arched doorways, and fountained courtyards intact. Roger Nazarian's interiors layer hand-cut Zellige tilework across walls and floors while stained-glass windows filter North African light into amber shafts. Most of the 200 rooms and suites open onto furnished terraces; the Sultan's Riad — a two-storey residence inside the sultan's original dwelling, offers nearly 1,000 square metres of living space and a private rooftop infinity pool that appears to spill into the Atlantic.
Sicilian-born Senior Executive Chef Sebastiano Spriveri, a Four Seasons veteran of nearly three decades, oversees seven venues. Verdello, the signature Italian restaurant set inside the 1912 Orangers heritage building, delivers Tonno Rosso carpaccio, Gragnano paccheri in tomato-basil sauce, and Aragosta di Agadir, local lobster with vanilla and thyme. Flamme centres on copper-clad ovens for breads and pizzas by day, then shifts into Flamme d'Orient for Moroccan evening dining. Laïla Lounge, hidden in the palace's oldest wing, pairs rare cognacs with live music late into the night. The spa offers 10 treatment rooms, a Moroccan hammam, and an indoor saltwater pool, while two outdoor pools — one garden-set, the other an infinity edge above the ocean, round out a day that might end with mint tea in the 12th-century Kasbah des Oudaias, steps away. UNESCO-listed since 2012, Rabat unfolds from this oceanfront palace like a story still being written.
