H10 Catalunya Plaza

Some hotels make statements, some push the boundaries of architecture or engineering or aesthetics, some invite you to live for a few days like a Ferragamo or a maharaja — and some, like Barcelona’s H10 Catalunya Plaza, are just good hotels. It starts with a polestar-central location right on Catalunya Plaza, at the axis of the Barri Gòtic, El Raval and L’Eixample, where La Rambla and Passeig de Gràcia intersect. (Did you hear the sonic boom as this page just shot up the search-engine rankings?) Arrive by train and the distance to the check-in desk may not be any longer than the line for a taxi; Catalunya station is twenty meters away.

Behind the building’s 19th-century façade is a well-designed modern hotel. Accommodations span from the tiny and functional basic room to the ornate, multi-balcony apartment inspired by the style of Catalan Art Nouveau. Whichever room you choose — and there’s plenty between the extremes — there will be no mood-interpreting light shows or mind-bending art installations, just comfortable pillow-topped beds, pristine bathrooms and plenty of natural light.

Beyond the rooms, there’s an attractive restaurant, a stylish little lobby bar and, this being Barcelona, the de rigueur “chill-out space.” It turns out the formula for getting people to chill is pretty straightforward: a lovely, leafy terrace set with candle-lit tables and strung with warm overhanging lights. And when the time comes to hit the streets, the city surrounds you in every direction.