First impressions are everything. And I didn’t make very good ones arriving at the five-star, harbourside Naples Romeo. My frown and grimace questioned the strident artistry of the erupting volcano behind the receptionist. Versed in the modern art of hospitality, check-in receptionist and all-round concierge Lorenzo put me straight with practised diplomacy. “I see you are admiring our 45000 Euro Andy Warhol original.”
My Adam’s apple appeared in the elevator. The fine arts education continued when, the lift doors opening onto my floor, I remarked on some of the strange places hotels place chairs. One was placed with a panoramic view of the elevator. The porter, another aesthete and art historian, briefed me.
Yes. We have black Maarten Bass-Mooi fireproof leather smoke chairs on all nine floors of the hotel. They are very valuable and highly collectible. Our hotel has a lot of chairs. We hang some on the walls. We exhibit them proudly.
It is so easy to be a philistine in Napoli. You don’t just stay at a Romeo Hotel. You immerse yourself in its unexpected and eclectic atmosphere. The hotel is a celebration of the emotions. Like every Romeo hotel, it has been designed and decorated to leave a memorable imprint.
Romeo Hotels, owned by lawyer Alfredo Romeo, has hotels in Rome and another one planned for the Sorrentine peninsula. They house Mr Romeo’s extensive art collection. His hotels are dedicated to relaxation and aesthetic allure. As well as sanctifying the simple perfection of everyday objects.
The old Palazzo Lauro is a building that radiates expressiveness. The Romeo Naples comes with its own artistic manifesto, believing a hotel is like a pearl which, in order not to perish, needs human warmth and the color of the air. There is more to it than its glinting perforated steel, glass, lattice, and gluco-bond panelling exterior. It is filled with a need to avoid a hint of monotony. Every space is a wonder room where apparently irreconcilable arts and distant traditions can stand side by side. Like the city it is in, it is a feast for the senses with an extravagant surprise around every corner.
The 79-room and suites Kenzo Tange-designed hotel beside the city’s main ferry and hydrofoil, and close to the Diego Maradona-dominated Spanish quarter, is full of artworks and artefacts from around the world. You have breakfast (Eggs in purgatory is the signature hot dish) beside a glass cabinet containing a collection of Hermes white porcelain and one containing a pair of Edo Period warrior uniforms and Japanese farmer work shirts. The buffet is on a marble wraparound sushi table.
Apertifs and sundowns are taken on the Krug La Terrazza. A bottle of Clos d’Ammonety 2006 is only 5800 euros. Dinner on the ninth floor can be the Alain Ducasse tasting menu with its roll-call of Chilled spaghettini with caviar, Mediterranean blue crab, white beans from Controne and chinotto, White asparagus, fermented Aglione della Valdichiana, zabaione of Amalfi coast, Raviolo with duck foie gras, chicken broth and coffee cascara, rock fish broth and acidic agretti, Roasted quail, and Alain Ducasse Manufacture chocolate soufflé. With Madagascar sorbet. You eat with a view of he harbour and an artistic masterpiece.
Room and public spaces feature works by Mario Shifano, Girolama Ciulla, Antonio Munziano, Umberto Mariani, Leilo Esposito, Christian Leperino, Renatop Guszzo, as well as photographs, lithographs, nineteenth-century Roman globes (both celestial and terrestrial), rocking horses, Parisian Berege armchairs, and lacquered foot stools. As well as an authentic 1950s AC Napoli football, to appreciate the obsolete is the triumph of authentic taste, a 1940s Wurlitzer jukebox, gilded Louis XV consoles, macassar ebony bookshelves, flooring and walling, lava stone, lava foam, and a lot of ebonized rosewood. There is a 480-year-old bonsai olive tree, a gravity fountain, watergraphic features, and a corridor called The Walk of the Primates, featuring a fire-lacquered steel work by Sergio Fermariello.
But all these masterpieces are outshone by the modern masterpieces of the hotel’s genius Sorrento-born pastry chef, Antonio Maresca, whose artful calorific creations are inspired by the knowledge that cooking is perhaps the only art in which all five senses are used at the same time.
His early morning and afternoon tea offering comprises a collection of sublime Neopolitan pastries, almond flour cakes, deep-fried graffas, Colonna Easter cake, exquisite lemon tartlets, squidgy chocolate choux, contemporary baked custard installations, plum and vanilla cake, and wickedly delicious strawberry-topped Zeppole cream puffs. You are welcome to take away anything you want for your picnic in nearby Pompeii. Warhol’s depiction of Vesuvius isn’t so easy to remove.
Good taste that defies luxurious standardization is at the heart of the Romeo Naples. And the hotel is at the heart of the fine arts of Campanian hospitality.
