Transatlantique Hotel, Casablanca

The Transatlantique Hotel in Casablanca takes its name from the ocean liner that once linked Marseille, Algiers, Tunis and this Atlantic port, and this guide traces the hotel back to 1922, when it rose in the freshly planned European quarter that Resident General Hubert Lyautey built beside the old medina. It follows the ambitions folded into that boulevard-and-Art-Deco blueprint, and the mix of arriving passengers and later legendary guests said to have passed through its doors. Stand at the entrance and take in the stonework built to greet steamship travelers stepping into an unfamiliar city.