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By Paul Johnson on Sep 16, 2016 in Accommodation, Bars, Europe, Family Travel, Featured, Food and Drink, Going Out, Hotels, Leisure Travel, Regions, Restaurants, Spain, Speciality Travel, Travel Miscellany, Videos, Western Europe – Read 1157 times
The superb Hotel Maria Cristina is a member of a Luxury Collection, has 136 bedrooms and was designed by Charles Mewès – a French designer who was also behind a Ritz hotels in both Paris and Madrid. Since a opening in 1912 it has been a organisation favourite with celebrities and general high multitude and, quite given a appearance of a San Sebastian Film Festival in 1953, a hotel has hosted a innumerable of stars from a shade including domicile names such as Elizabeth Taylor, Bette Davis, Woody Allen, Julia Roberts, Richard Gere, Brad Pitt and Susan Sarandon.
The welcome
We had trafficked by automobile from Cantabria and, on reaching a hotel, were greeted by staff during a entrance, where a luggage we compulsory for a stay (we had a rather full automobile from a progressing travels so usually indispensable a integrate of bags from it!) was unloaded and taken to a room. Whilst we sorted a formalities of check-in and my automobile was parked for me, staff chatted to my mother and a children who were presented with soft, cuddly frogs and a story to accompany them. (The Mediterranean tree frog is internal to a Basque Country though underneath hazard due to disappearing habitats.)
After being given some useful information about internal attractions and endorsed pinchos bars, we were shown to a room on a fourth floor: a Bette Davis Suite.
The room
To call it usually a room is a serious injustice! The Bette Davis Suite consists of a corridor lined with photographs of a actress, a lounge, bedroom and bathroom, and a second bedroom and lavatory can be incorporated within a suite, depending on a series of occupants. This is a really apartment that Bette Davis stayed in when she was celebrated during a San Sebastian Film Festival in 1989 – one of her final open appearances – and has been tastefully modernised with a Belle Époque-inspired interior.
The apartment is not usually in gripping with a character and loftiness of a building though it also serves as a still breakwater of luxury, character and record which, when combined, make for an memorable stay.
The master bedroom has a oppulance pillow-top bed with a chaise longue during a foot.
We also had a adjoining twin-bedded room for a children.
Both bedrooms afforded us city, stream and sea views.
The bathroom
The lavatory is simply furnished with primarily black and white sum and a brick-like settlement to a tiles.
Loewe toiletries are granted – an iconic code in Spain that is so good determined that it indeed pre-dates a hotel by some-more than 60 years!
Our boys had their possess lavatory and their possess Looney Tunes amenities.
The facilities
Although we didn’t eat anything other than breakfast during a hotel’s Easo Restaurant, Michelin-starred cook Hélène Darroze (she has one Michelin star during her grill in Paris and dual in London) is heading a Pop-up Restaurant for a duration to Oct 2016. There is also a Asian-inspired Café Saigon to select from, and a hotel’s superb Dry Bar that is renouned for cocktails.
The open areas are really grand and beautifully ornate and, dark divided downstairs on one side of a hotel is San Sebastian Food, a abounding cooking propagandize charity courses and tours. More on that in a apart blog post. Such is a adore for food in this area of Spain that direct is high so book ahead!
Other good touches
There was a bottle of Champagne, some non-alcoholic beverages and a image of fruit in a apartment to hail us on arrival.
As mentioned earlier, a children were also presented with a frog and a poetic story book while we checked in, that done for a lovely, accepted welcome.
Cost
The Bette Davis Suite has rates starting from 874 euros per night out of season. Deluxe and reward bedrooms start from 190 euros per night.
The best bit
Although we enjoyed each aspect a brief stay during a hotel, it is tough to demeanour over a apartment itself that is so beautifully and tastefully finished.
The final verdict
It is formidable to do a apartment like this probity with content and cinema alone so we shot a brief video to give we a bit some-more of an discernment into a peculiarity of a accommodation and a layout. My video skills still leave something to be desired, and substantially don’t do it a probity it deserves, though we wish we suffer it all a same.
Disclosure: Our stay was hosted by Hotel Maria Cristina and shaped partial of a outing sponsored by Brittany Ferries.
