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Ahoueke Hilaire
Upper gallery at La Sultana, crystal chandelier and turned-wood balustrade above the pink patio.

La Sultana Marrakech · Marrakech · 2026

La Sultana Marrakech: photographing a set of Kasbah riads, room by room

La Sultana Marrakech is a set of restored riads in the heart of the Kasbah, inside the listed medina. The series was made during a stay, in the winter of 2025-2026, as a collaboration rather than a commission: a stay, and images.

Services
Hospitality photography, Interiors, Food photography, Marrakech
Credits
La Sultana Marrakech

Context

La Sultana occupies a set of restored riads on rue de la Kasbah, in the heart of the listed Marrakech medina. Five stars, twenty-eight rooms all different from one another, two rooftops, a fine-dining restaurant and a pink marble spa with a hammam. The house is affiliated with Virtuoso and Serandipians, and on Sundays seafood platters come up from La Sultana Oualidia. The series was not quoted for: it is a collaboration, a stay in exchange for images, and this page says so rather than dressing it up as a commission.

Challenge

A riad is a building that closes on itself. There is no façade to photograph, and light only enters through the patio, which means vertically and for a few hours a day. The salons are dark, the walls are carved, and neither stucco nor marquetry returns anything under frontal light. A problem of number comes with it: twenty-eight rooms, all different, which rules out making one typical frame and offering it for the whole.

Approach

Interiors were handled on available light, looking for the angle where it arrives from the side, which is the only way to make carved stucco or marquetry read. The upper galleries served as the viewpoint for showing the plan of the patios, which the ground floor does not allow. The pool was taken twice, in full sun through the palm fronds and in shade at the end of the day, because still water then returns the whole wall. On the food and service side, the house uniforms — the embroidered kaftan, the red cape, the navy jacket — supplied the backgrounds, which avoids setting anything up in a medina you can only cross on foot.

Deliverables

A series covering the patios, a room, the salons, the pool, the service and the food, sent to the property at the end of December 2025.

Usage rights

The frame is a collaboration, with no quote and no formalised assignment: no scope of licence is stated here. Releases are on file for everyone appearing in frame.

Outcome

The property’s media desk replied on 30 December 2025: “Thank you for your message and for sending the photographs, which we liked very much.” The Moroccan context is set out on the hotel photographer in Marrakech page.

Credits

Place
La Sultana Marrakech, rue de la Kasbah, medina
Frame
Collaboration, a stay in exchange for images
Production
Winter 2025-2026
Sent
End of December 2025
Services
Hospitality, interiors, food, service

Excessive drinking is harmful to health. Please drink responsibly.

Turquoise pool and brick arcades seen through the fronds of a date palm, loungers in a row at the edge.
The pool seen through the fronds. The date palm is not an accident of framing: it gives the arcades their scale.
Horseshoe arch in carved stucco opening onto a dark salon, a red walkway above a planted bed.
The stucco arch, backlit onto the salon. The relief only reads when the light arrives from the side.
Upper gallery furnished with armchairs, crystal chandelier and turned-wood balustrade above the pink patio.
The upper gallery over the patio. Riads are photographed from their galleries: that is where you see the plan.
Pool and brick arcades in shade, palm shadows thrown across the walls and the still water.
The same pool in shade, at the end of the day. The water does not move, so it returns the whole wall.
Bedroom with a wrought-iron four-poster bed, white linen, embroidered cushions and carved panelling.
One room: all twenty-eight are different, so no single image stands for the others.
Salon with brick walls and a segmental arch, Venetian glass chandelier, pale sofa and a fruit tray.
A brick salon under a Venetian chandelier. The mixture is the house itself: Moroccan brick, Italian glass.
Figure in a red cape and fez standing at the end of a dark corridor lined with lanterns and carved wood.
At the end of the corridor, under the lanterns. The red cape is the only light point: it is what holds the image together.
White bowl of mushroom pasta with an edible flower, held in two hands in front of an embroidered red kaftan.
The bowl held in front of the embroidered kaftan: the service dress makes a background nothing else here can match.
Hand in a white cuff pouring sauce from a jug onto a plated dish, green marble table.
The sauce poured on green marble. The ribbon is poured once only: focus is set beforehand.
Waiter in a navy jacket presenting an amber glass garnished with a long orange zest in two hands.
The glass presented in two hands. The dark suit absorbs the light and leaves the glass alone lit.
Green cocktail glass on an inlaid pedestal table, in front of a dark timber mashrabiya screen.
A green glass on the marquetry, in front of the mashrabiya. Nothing is added: the furniture makes the still life.

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