Executive SPA Hotel

The name doesn’t quite do justice to a hotel that takes an unusual late-modernist structure in Fiorano Modenese — the home of Ferrari, among other attractions in Italy’s so-called Motor Valley — and transforms it into an ultra-stylish, ultra-contemporary boutique hospitality experience. Executive Spa Hotel’s 1980s silhouette seems built for speed, but inside, it’s a state-of-the-art hotel whose 64 rooms showcase the finest fixtures and furnishings from today’s top Italian makers.

Its interior design and its art collection evoke an idealized vision of modernism’s Fifties heyday, though viewed through a contemporary lens — the finishes and materials are substantial, even serious, while the colors, though subtle, are unmistakably 21st-century. The rooms aren’t vast, but are spacious enough, and are efficiently laid out and supplied with plentiful natural light. Suites, on the other hand, do spread out, and the largest ones feature walk-in closets and balconies.

The spa lives up to its billing, and is accompanied by a gym that includes yoga, Pilates, and personal training. Exé, the restaurant, serves the sort of artful contemporary Italian cuisine that you have every right to expect, when in Emilia-Romagna; Alto, meanwhile, serves lighter fare on the rooftop with an impressively far-ranging view.