A warm Anglo-Moroccan welcome to Riad Azawan from Saïd, Teresa and Ayoub. Azawan means ‘music’ in Amazigh, the language of the original Berber inhabitants of Morocco. Saïd and Teresa met at a music festival in the Moroccan Sahara in 2013, hence the name. Many festivals later, we welcome you to our riad guesthouse in the Marrakech medina, where our aim is to share our passion for Morocco with you, our guests, to help you make the most of the magical city of Marrakech.

Riad Azawan combines traditional Moroccan home life with 21st century comforts, first-rate customer service and attention to those little details that make all the difference. Our riad is a little jewel, with walls a metre thick which, along with the electric roof over our patio, keep us cool in summer and warm in winter. The riad was renovated in 2008 with the help of maa’lems (expert craftsmen) from Saïd and Ayoub’s home village south over the Atlas Mountains in the Draa Valley. The bedrooms are simple but comfortable. The ground floor patio bedroom has traditional tadelakt walls in a sumptuous deep red colour. All the bathrooms have tadelakt walls and floors, as do the salons, stairs and first-floor gallery. The four ensuite bedrooms have air-con and heating. Two of the bedrooms can be configured as twin rooms. We have plenty of space for you to rest and relax: a summer salon on the first floor overlooking the patio, and downstairs a winter salon with open fireplace to keep us cosy during those cold Marrakech winter nights. The ground floor patio has a traditional tinkling fountain: flowing water is at the heart of every Islamic garden. Because of our location close to the southern walls of the city, the large roof terrace has a wonderful view of the Atlas Mountains. We have sunbeds, parasols and a sheltered seating area on the terrace, the latter with a misting system to keep you cool in the heat. Both sunrise and sunset are magical times on our terrace. Morning is cool and full of promise for the day ahead - a great time for yoga or meditation. The evening breezes rustle the fronds of the tall palm tree in the little square in front of the riad, and the swifts swoop and dive overhead, with the occasional stork flapping its lazy way to roost. The peace of the riad is broken only by the call to prayer, a crowing cock, the voices of the local children playing evening games on the square, or the sound of music from our patio. Please make yourself at home...

Riad Azawan is situated on the very southern edge of the medina, in the historic Kasbah ‘quartier’, home to the imposing Moulay Yazid mosque and the exquisitely beautiful Saadien Tombs. Kasbah is residential, though with a sprinkling of riads, spas and some excellent cafés and restaurants. The famous Café Clock is our ‘local’. British-owned, it has English-speaking staff, great food, art exhibitions and a daily programme of live music or storytelling. And Café Kasbah has pizzas that would hold their own in an Italian trattoria! We love eating on Rue de la Kasbah where the snack bars fire up their barbecues in the evening and the locals have dinner on their way home from work – the atmosphere is pure Marrakech energy! So, our neighbourhood is a lively, authentic working community, and it’s a great place to watch medina life unfold. The streets are full of djellebah tailors, furniture-makers, moped repair shops and the Moroccan equivalent of the corner shop, open all hours. We have a wonderful food souk where we can take you shopping with us if you fancy dinner in the riad. We can serve you fresh fish from the Atlantic ports of Agadir, Essaouira or Safi, or a traditional Marrakech ‘tangia’ stew, prepared and spiced by a local butcher, which we take to be slow-cooked in the communal oven. It’s also a safe area, clean and well-lit. And our riad is a two-minute walk from where the taxis can drop you off, or five minutes from local parking. That amazing hub of medina life, the Jamaa El Fna square, is a straightforward and easy ten-minute walk away through streets which are always full of life, or a taxi-ride to the square costs around 10 dirhams.