Inside Rosemary, the five-room Marrakech riad where LRNCE’s Laurence Leenaert and Ayoub Boualam turned a crumbling heritage home into their most personal work yet.
There is a particular kind of magic that happens when an artist stops making objects for a room and starts making a room itself. That is precisely what unfolds at Rosemary, the much-anticipated boutique riad that opened its carved cedar doors in September 2023 in one of the oldest quarters of Marrakech’s medina. The five-suite property is the brainchild of Laurence Leenaert, the Belgian-born artist and designer behind the cult label LRNCE, and her husband Ayoub Boualam, marking the couple’s first foray into hospitality after a decade spent building one of the most collectible names in contemporary Moroccan craft.
Since co-founding LRNCE in 2013, Leenaert has become known for hand-painted ceramics, richly textural rugs, and eye-popping furniture and framed works that favor voluptuous brushstrokes, carved details, and cut-outs in hues lifted straight from the landscapes surrounding Marrakech. Her work has moved well beyond the city’s artistic circles, into galleries and exhibitions in New York, Paris, London, and Tokyo, and into the collections of enthusiasts worldwide. Rosemary is what happens when that same eye is turned, for the first time, on a building, a hand-crafted reimagining of one of the Red City’s most emblematic architectural forms.
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A heritage home, reborn
The riad itself, Riad Zitoun Jdid, was originally designed by Quentin Wilbaux, the architect and historian who has documented and personally restored close to 150 properties across the medina. Long before it became a hotel, it was a beloved family home, which Laurence and Ayoub acquired in early 2021. Its new name is a quiet nod to “Marie-Rose,” the riad’s former owner, as well as to the herb itself, rosemary appears throughout the property as a recurring motif, in the bespoke scents commissioned for the space and, fittingly, in the planting.
“Getting to know Rosemary has been a significant part of my artistic evolution,” Laurence has said of the project. “I had to think through the whole experience, from start to finish, in order to create an authentically modern Marrakchi world.”
That thinking-through shows in every corner. Some twenty master craftsmen and women were employed to realize the couple’s vision, many of them recruited after extensive travel across the country: stained-glass specialists in Meknes, potters in Safi, hand-chiselled zellige tile-makers in Fes, marble vendors in Rabat. Others, the carpenters, metalworkers, and plasterers, live locally, including the team who hand-poured the courtyard’s terrazzo tiles at a rate of just thirty a day, and the artisans who inserted eight thousand pieces of red marble into lozenge patterns on the main staircase.
No detail left to chance
Laurence’s own hand is everywhere, too. While work on the riad was underway, she set about making trademark custom pieces of furniture, a cedarwood sideboard in the Rosemary Suite, sinuous wrought-iron door handles, hand-painted bathroom tiles, and sculptural sandstone planters, a new medium for the artist. You’ll find her own paintings on the walls throughout, hung alongside treasured pieces by artist friends and drawn from her private collection.
Years of collecting also went into sourcing vintage Scarpa armchairs, 1920s writing desks, American Fanimation ceiling fans, and Beldi glass tumblers inspired by antique whisky glasses, all tied together with polished silverware and a dash of humor in the details, an octopus motif and angular relief plasterwork recur through the house, discoverable in nearly every corner. On the rooftop terrace, a self-designed wedding chair sits shaded beneath a forty-year-old Jacaranda tree that sprouts from the courtyard below, while a vintage Mercedes grand taxi, a relic of Marrakech’s golden age, collects guests from the airport in a heady blast of retro glamour.
Beyond the room
Ever keen to share their own learning journey, Laurence and Ayoub have built out a program of immersive experiences that go beyond the usual cooking classes and language lessons (though those are available too, if desired). Guests can mix their own soaps and hammam scrubs using traditional herbs, spices, and flowers sourced from the nearby Mellah, or take tablescaping and traditional craft classes taught by Laurence herself, a chance to dive into the stories behind the objects that surround you.
Much of the art and decor throughout the riad is, notably, for sale, from the vintage armchairs and statement lamps to LRNCE-designed linens, stationery, bespoke scented toiletries, and even original framed artwork like “the sea view” piece hanging in the Bird Nest Suite. Guests can also order directly from the LRNCE online store, with same-day delivery to the riad.
The basics
Rates start at €220 in low season for a small room, rising to €450 for the Rosemary Suite; special single-occupancy rates are available for the small room. Full buyouts can accommodate private gatherings of up to forty for a cocktail party, or house parties of up to ten guests, and the riad is also available for photoshoots and brand promotions. Located just fifteen minutes from Marrakech airport, with private transfers available on request.
Welcome to Rosemary. Your hand-crafted home in Marrakech. rosemarymarrakech.com
Pictures by Marina Denisova