Fodor's Expert Review The Madrid Edition

Ian Schrager, the visionary hotelier best known for creating Studio 54, is the brains behind one of Madrid's most buzzed-about hotel openings in recent memory. The Edition's gargantuan alabaster spiral staircase, blue-felted billiard table hewn from solid marble, and rooftop infinity pool—the largest in Madrid—are the splashiest features, even if the architect, minimalism mastermind John Pawson, put as much care into the guest rooms, which have all-white furniture and ceiling-height curvilinear headboards mirroring the hotel's 17th-century doorway. There are two celebrity-chef restaurants on site (Mexican by Enrique Olvera on the ground floor; Peruvian by Diego Muñoz on the roof), plus a lobby bar and lounge where you can have a nightcap in a pony-hair Jean-Michel Frank armchair. It's all scintillatingly current—and worth peeking into, even if an overnight stay isn't in the cards.