Alchymist Grand Hotel & Spa

The spirit of Casanova, who spent his final years in Bohemia, permeates this lavish Baroque hotel squeezed between Prague Castle and Petřín Hill in Malá Strana, an atmospheric district of palaces, gardens and monasteries seemingly pulled from a fairy tale. Drawing from the zenith of the Venetian Renaissance, the hotel endows its 26 rooms and 19 suites with heavy doses of gilded filigree, including antique furnishings, royal textiles, hand-painted wallpaper, crystal chandeliers and parquet floors that look fit for an Italian princess. The same aesthetic fills the common areas, particularly in Alchymist Restaurant, where the walls are coated in Venetian stucco and hand-painted murals. The contrast makes the hotel’s Indonesian-inspired Ecsotica Spa, fashioned out of the 11th-century Gothic cellars, pop even more.