We stayed at the riad on family holiday in Nov 2009. We had a great time in Marrakech and Laurence and her husband as well as Fatima and Fatima made every effort to look after us. In fact on the holiday it was also my birthday. We came back from a walk on our final day to find they had arranged a cake and tea to mark the occasion.

The riad was beautiful with each room individually styled. It wasn't the cheapest riad available and at times we were short of hot water, but on the whole it was a great riad with excellent service!

After a longish flight and an entertaining (terrifying) taxi ride we arrived to be greeted by staff offering us very tasty mint tea. Our room was not ready when we arrived but the owner got it sorted quickly. The room was really lovely in design, the bed extremely comfortable, the room spacious and with aircon that just about worked. The bathroom was very nice, the shower good, there is always hot water unless you have a very long shower, but the bath is made of concrete with a marble floor, and is suffering with damp and mould. When the curtains are closed the room goes very dark, which with the aircon and comfy bed resulted in much good sleep which is very welcome.

We did pay a little extra for a suite, but in reality we got a normal hotel room with no extra space and with no real extra's at all - in essence a basic hotel room. We should have just booked a normal room as the suite doesn't exactly have chocolate's on your pillow. The Riad in appearance is very well maintained, but after a day or two you do sort of scratch you head and wonder what exactly you are paying for and the price is about as high as it could be before becoming annoying. You're basically paying for a nice bed and a bit of floor space. Still, it does look nice.

One of the main reasons we booked this hotel was that we imagined it may be too hot to do much in the middle of the afternoon's, and this traditional riad could meet our needs with it's sun terrace which included sun loungers. Well, basically, this is a complete mistruth. There is a small terrace but it's still being built (interesting to watch during breakfast actually...) and there are no sun loungers and no space for sun loungers so I don't see that changing soon. It's nice, it's just not a place to sit and relax with a good book when avoiding the madness outside when the temperature is soaring. We spent a bit of time having a siesta in our room but the building work on the terrace interrupted this.

When we left the Riad we came to pay and the cost was higher than we expected, owing to an exchange rate in the favour of the hotel. We booked through a website so read the small print and check that the price in MAD matches the exchange rate for sterling - or book through a well-known agent that you trust. Niaive of us perhaps, but still irritating.

The staff were very nice and attentive, very friendly, tried to use English or communicate with us - our French is poor. They certainly cannot be faulted in their efforts to make us welcome. Breakfast was great, just what we needed, European style with delicious coffee. They offered us excursions and taxi's but they were not open to negotiation on price and so we haggled in the city with great success. The Riad prices were not extortionate but it's worth shopping around.

If you want to find the madness of the main square and souk then this riad is a tem-minute walk from there - easy to reach but just far enough away to feel like you are out of the main hustle and bustle. That is probably its best feature along with the good night's sleep you will get.

After a good deal of research we settled on this Riad for our weeks stay in Marrakech. We chose it because of its location, the description of the accommodation and the ambiance it appeared to portray. Big mistake! We were met at the airport and had a smooth trip into the Medina. The Riad was only a few minutes from the road so it was not far to walk with luggage. On arrival we were greeted by mother and daughter. So up until this point all seemed well. However, once inside,we found the Riad to be very badly lit and dim. We were in the 'Sherazade Suite' which in fact was a small; double. The room was so badly lit that we could not see to work the remote control for the tv. and any chance of refreshing ones make-up was impossible! The bathroom was a good size but there was black mould on the concrete walls. As it was mid evening we decided to go straight out only to find that the square was a good 25 minutes walk. On our return we had to pass several groups of men gathered in doorways which was a bit unnerving The next morning we could not open the curtains on the bedroom window as the window directly overlooked the public area. Breakfast was served on the terrace which was a small tired looking area consisting of a few tables and two sunbeds and the only view was of the neighbouring buildings - really not pleasant. At this point we decided to relocate to a hotel outside the Medina (incidently this was 5 star and cost the same!) When we announced our intention to move, the daughter called in Laurence who spoke perfect english. We had paid for our week in advance through Booking.com and although we did not expect a refund we did feel that an agreement could be reached. Laurence informed us Booking.Com
would not allow cancellations. We did infact ring Bookng.com ourselves who advised that this was not the case. On relaying this information to Laurence she rang the 'owner' who flatly refused to refund us any monies. She did however refund us the commission that Booking.com would have taken. Laurence led us to believe that she was the manager but on reading other reviews on this site, she is described as the owners wife! I will say that she appeared to try really hard to help us but was very conscious that we were going to write a negative review. To sum up - we paid 537 euros for l nights stay in what we would describe as poor accommodation.
On the good side we spent an excellent 6 nights in a hotel just outside the Medina (which was still only 20 minutes walk into the square). There are some lovely restaurants in the new town offering very good Moroccan wines!

We booked the riad trough a booking site, after a few weeks I got an e-mail from Laurence the riad owner with the offer to pick me up at the airport.

When we arrived in Marrakech the cab driver was welcoming us at the airport. He brought us to the riad where Laurence and his wife welcomed us very friendly!

If you decide to go here I do advice you to take the taxi offer they charge you 200 dirham which is about 18 euro. If you do a lot of bargaining on the airport of course you can get it a bit cheaper but you never know where they take you... It is also pretty hard to find if you come to the Riad for the first time.

Laurence and his wife do talk very good French and English. On our first evening we had a dinner on the roof terace. The dinner was ok... not very spectacular but the quality was good, price a bit high for (24 euro's for tomato salad / chicken tagine / fruit salad)
The breakfast was good with every day freshly squeezed orange juice and pancakes.
The rooms clean and clean towels every day!
Staff very helpfull and freindly

For everybody who decide's to go here...a good stay can be expected

Thanks team of the Mille et une Nuits !