Casa Olivia

Style

Barrio’s best-dressed

Setting

Magical Mérida

Casa Olivia rocks its colonial colours with panache, and it’s quite the get-up. An unassuming black door with a rusting gargoyle knocker leads the way inside this Rudyard Kipling fever dream, all monochromatic checkerboard floor tiles, antique loveseats, hand-painted cornicing, decorative wooden armoires and wrought-iron spiral staircases. Guests weary of basking poolside in the blazing Mexican sun sip mezcal margaritas beneath rotating ceiling-fans in the lost-in-time bar (which could just as easily have been installed in 1821 as 2021), as giant potted-palm fronds sway gently in the downdraft. A similarly superb sensory experience awaits on the enchanting streets of Mérida’s old town, directly outside the casa.

Facilities

Rooms

Four, of which two are suites.

Checkout

Noon. Check-in is at 3pm. Both are flexible when availability allows.

More Details

Rates include an extensive three-course breakfast including fresh fruit, local dishes, small cakes and desserts and lashings of coffee and fruit juice. It’s served at the breakfast table in the bar area or on the small garden patio.

Also

Unfortunately this hotel isn't best suited to guests with mobility issues.

Free Internet Access

Laundry

Pool

At the Hotel

Small boutique and free WiFi. In rooms: air-conditioning, free bottled water and L’Occitane bathroom amenities.

Our Favourite Rooms

The twin joys of direct pool access and an actual garden in the bathroom make ground-floor suite Olivia the cream of a very fine crop. Large patio doors (with antique wooden shutters for privacy, natch) lead onto the terrace while, inside the suite, you can gaze up at high ceilings with hand-painted cornicing and a hypnotic spinning fan from your lavish king bed. The bathroom in here is something else: a chandelier hangs over the twin rainfall showers and bath tub and there’s a garden area which has taken that old cliché of ‘bringing the outside inside’ and turned it into a foliage-festooned (sur)reality.

Poolside

An ornate overflowing fountain trickles tranquilly into the narrow terrace pool, which is open 24 hours and flanked by high stucco walls, loungers, day-beds and verdant foliage. Even the public WC out here, complete with antique wooden door, hand-painted walls, boat-sized mirror and a sink apparently hewn from solid rock, seems to have been plucked straight from a movie set.

Packing Tips

The Yucatán Peninsula’s intoxicating mix of Spanish colonialism and ancient Mayan culture is manna for photographers and history buffs. Arm yourself with an old-fashioned 35mm film camera for snapping those colourful houses and ancient ruins, and a book on Mayan civilisation to leaf through during those long intervals spent sipping espresso at plaza cafés. And pick up a take-home bottle of mezcal at the hotel's boutique.

Also

Each of the four rooms here – Olivia, Ofelia, Olga and Orietta – is named after a member of the family that owns the casa.

Children

No unicorn-shaped rubber rings or spaghetti-spattered high-chairs here; Casa Olivia is just for the grown-ups.

Gallery

Food & Drink

Top Table

The internal garden courtyard by the wrought-iron spiral staircase is pole position for a long, languid breakfast.

Dress Code

This casa is made for colonial cosplay, so rock those oatmeal linen suits, colourful floral prints and pristine panama hats for the most authentic selfies in the bar and by the pool.

Hotel Restaurant

There’s no restaurant on site, but there are several casual cafés dotted around the plaza, and staff can provide a long list of the best places to dine around the old town.

Hotel Bar

The colonial-era style of the bar, with its antique wooden display cabinets, checkerboard tiles and swaying palm fronds, is such that you wouldn’t be at all surprised to spot the ghosts of Somerset Maugham and Graham Greene noisily slurping the mezcal-laced signature margaritas. The bar opens on request and closes at 9pm, with an honesty policy operating thereafter.

Last Orders

The bar’s open until 9pm, after which an honesty policy applies for night owls.

Planes

Mérida International Airport is served by daily direct flights from a number of destinations in the Americas, including Miami, Dallas, Houston and Toronto. It’s a fairly straightforward whiz along Highway 261 to reach Casa Olivia, taking between 15 and 25 minutes depending on traffic. Private transfers can be arranged from Mex$1,200.

Automobiles

Mérida’s grid-like layout makes it easy to navigate, with narrow streets and broad plazas that beg to be explored on foot, so it’s unlikely you’ll need a car unless you plan to visit the wider Yucatán Peninsula. Even then, you may find it less stressful to have the city’s seasoned bus and cab drivers navigate the city’s convoluted network of one-way streets for you. If you do opt for your own vehicle, there are several rental desks at the airport and parking is free in the Parque de Santiago in front of Casa Olivia.

Worth Getting Out of Bed For

Centuries-old cathedrals, leafy plazas and colourful colonial buildings in pale peach, powder-puff pink and periwinkle purple are among the many no-filter-needed gems you’ll discover on a stroll through the narrow lanes of Mérida’s magical old town. Right outside the casa’s front door, Plaza de Santiago is as good a place to start as any. Grab a table at one of the cafés that line the perimeter and people-watch over a brick-sized slab of homemade tres leches cake.

From one unmissable Mexican confection to another, Mérida Cathedral’s intoxicating blend of Moorish towers and Renaissance interiors should be your first port of call on Plaza Grande. Built using stone from local Mayan ruins, this 16th-century stalwart is only the oldest mainland cathedral in the Americas. Afterwards, grab a gelato and plan the rest of your day in the shade of the plaza’s huge laurel trees. Frankly, you could just spend it here, where a Sunday craft market, nightly live music and ancient Maya ball-game tournaments on Fridays mean there’s rarely a dull moment. Other must-sees around the plaza include local artist Fernando Castro Pacheco’s hallucinatory series of Spanish Conquest abstracts inside the grandiose Governor's Palace and the ever-rotating collection of paintings and sculptures at the free MACAY contemporary art museum, housed, of course, inside a former colonial palace.

If you’re in the mercado for something a little more immersive, join a foodie tour of Santa Ana or San Benito market for a real flavour of the region. We’re talking a kaleidoscopic cornucopia of colourful and exotic produce like hot habaneros, refreshing cactus juice and sweet guaya fruit sprinkled with chilli powder. And don’t dare leave without feasting on Yucatán specialities like cochinita pibil (zingy pulled pork) and papadzules, the habanero-spiced Mayan forerunner to modern enchiladas. You can thank us later.

Work it all off with a sightseeing cycle around the old town. On Sundays, the streets close to motorised traffic, making it an ideal time to cruise up and down tree-lined Paseo de Montejo on two wheels, pausing to admire the monuments, mansions and contemporary sculptures that flank this beautiful broad (and usually traffic-heavy) avenue.

Finally, it would be remiss to visit the Yucatán for more than a couple of days without donning your Indiana Jones hat (and whip, if you’re into that kind of thing) and venturing to some of the region’s exceptionally well-preserved Mayan archeological sites. Chichén Itzá, around two hours out of town, is the big kahuna locally, but those in the know follow the path of the gods to Uxmal. Not only is it closer, it’s generally less crowded too, and its ornate stone carvings, towering pyramids and other ceremonial buildings deliver just as much wow factor.

Earn or Redeem Points with World of Hyatt

This Mr & Mrs Smith hotel participates in the World of Hyatt loyalty program. As a member, you can earn and redeem points and enjoy exclusive benefits for qualifying nights. .