Normally I always prefer an old-style hotel. You know, one full of high-flying stucco, heavy fireplaces and Louis XVI furniture.
But Madrid is not normal. Or at least to at Scandinavian-born paleface living on the border of rainy Normandy, Madrid in high summer, 36 degrees’ Celsius, is not normal at all.
So I went deliberately for at cool design hotel with even cooler air-conditioning. A minimalist, four-star with freshly ironed bed linen and a king size bathroom worthy of a coffee table-book.
I got it at Vincci Soho, and I wasn’t disappointed, even though – admittedly – the design part was a little far-fetched: Shredded tinfoil looking like old Christmas decorations glittering in glass bottles and hundreds of silver butterflies fastened to the wall-paper. Not exactly my vision of chic design. But what a luxury to enter the ice-cold room, aesthetically cleared of everything besides a huge bed, two armchairs and free candy at the mini bar.
I was just lying there in the end of the afternoon with my swollen feet, exhausted by heat and too much good art at theThyssen-Bornemisza Museum a few blocks away. Now I understand why the Spanish hide for siesta all afternoon. It should be a human right, and in Madrid the only way to recover before night (when the city really wakes up).
I truly enjoyed this hotel, and even though the so-called design seems a little tired and the fake blonde cleaning lady sees it as her right to yell out all details of her life – in Spanish – at 7:30 in the morning just outside my room, I still recommend it.
Not many hotels could boast a better address. Vincci Soho is placed right in the epicentre of the Spanish capital, and the hotel’s terrace bar, wedged between two buildings, is such a cosy little pocket. To start the night here, after a long, cool bath, I felt happiness close by. Sipping a Tinto de Verano, a wonderful *** mix of red wine and lemonade, life couldn’t be much easier. And it doesn’t hurt the design that the neighbour of the bar is hanging her washing out of the window.
Plaza Santa Ana
For winter-goers, however, the bar might be less charming. The interior part of it is totally sexless – so stripped of life that even the Wallpaper guide, who normally praises a shaven design, says it lacks atmosphere. But okay, that’s a minor fault for a hotel situated 200 steps away from the bars and tabernas at Plaza Santa Ana and with the nightlife in Calle de las Huertas right in the backyard. With an address like this, nobody is obliged to stay in the hotel bar. But Vincci Soho is nice to come home to – and cool to wake up in.
Vincci Soho; C/ Prado 18