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Get there soon: Aleppo is poised to become the chicest destination in the Middle East. Kate Eshelby explains why Christian Louboutin and Nicky Haslam just love Syria’s second city.
Aleppo scrapes up against the underbelly of Turkey and is a dusty, nougat-coloured Ottoman delight. It’s where Christian Louboutin has just bought a house; where the Parisians are flocking in droves; where the deeply chic antiques collector Joseph Achkar is searching for somewhere to buy; and where Nicky Haslam is thinking of having his 70th birthday.
citadel
Why? Because Aleppo is Marrakech before the macchiato invasion; Damascus, but without the crowds and architecturally more intact. When Rome was built in 750BC Aleppo was already 2,500 years old. Ancient indeed, but in Aleppo, you feel like you’re the first person here. No one speaks a word of English, but it couldn’t be friendlier or less judgemental.
Slower, calmer, with a much more Mediterranean vibe than much of the Middle East, there’s lots of afternoon napping here, lots of pigeon-keeping and lengthy all-day feasting. Wander at night through hidden alleys and endless iron-studded gates and you’ll find quiet lantern-lit, cobbled squares with families spread out like butter away from the heat of the day. There will old gents in caps – doing very little – and men with their heads wrapped in red and white scarves trotting past donkeys. Falafel will be frying in oil in pans and the scent of mint skipping out from window ledges. Hand-pulled carts bump over the cobbles, pilled high with cherries, apricots and shiny-fresh strawberries.
mansouriya hotel
But if the city is really to separate itself from the rest of the pack, the Aleppo, at root, has a trinity of winning ways. The souk is the first. It’s wild and more beautiful than the souk in Damascus, partly because it was built with the famous Aleppo stone. Creamy-white during the day, the limestone turns lemony or peachy pink depending on whether the sun is rising or setting. Here you’ll find folklore jackets and scarves in whine-deep burgundies and butterscotch yellows. Buy brightly coloured glass lanterns, embroidered bedspreads, stunning jewellery and Aleppo’s aged, hand-made soap, made naturally from olive oil and laurel. It’s amazingly good for your skin.
Follow the smell of soap out of the souk itself and you’ll come across one of the most magnificent sights in all Aleppo; the old soap warehouse, filled with barrels of herbs, a sea of sage. And in the old souk, seek out the city’s only Buddhist (ask anyone where to find him). Adam’s shop is full of striking jewellery and silks but there’s no money exchanged here. Pick whatever you like from the shelves, and simply leave something else in return. (Next door you’ll find his brother, who’s quite the opposite, and charges a fortune for the tiniest nugget).
The second unmissable highlight is the best hotel in the Middle East. The Mansouriya is wonderful and theatrical. You can tell it’s owned by Europeans but you can also tell they’ve immersed themselves in the local history – seriously knowing it, loving it. It only has nine rooms and is sited in a 16th-century Ottoman Arabic house. Huge stone lions dramatically flank the feet of the beds while sunken bathrooms have showers housed in cages and marble baths with alphabet inscriptions scored into the sides.
If the Mansouriya is, for now, a well-kept secret, its kitchens are becoming less so: perfect jam, desert truffles, broad bean stews. The food in the city (with its endless Turkish, Armenian, Jewish and Greek influences) is now known to outstrip anything else in the entire country – by a mile. Don’t miss out on the lamb with black cherries at Emerald and book into the new Zmorod, with its wooden carved balcony and its own alluring private dining room. At Dar Zamaria there’s an open rooftop terrace with glorious views over the city and of the citadel lit up at night.
Ah, the citadel. The final symbol of intrigue that completes Aleppo’s big three. Wander out of the main passage of the souk and you’re blasted by the sturdy vision of it on it’s mound-throne, the hulk of it silhouetted against the sky. It is awe-inspiring; domes of mosques circle it like boiled egg tops, and the yolk-yellow dome of a hammam beams out. A giant picture of the president, Bashar al-Assad – a moderate man and former optometrist –stares out from the façade of a stately government building. With a strange moustache and in a brown suit, Bashar peeks out of every shop, market, house and home.
aleppo souk
In the early evenings there are hammams where you can be scrubbed down by voluptuous ladies. There are hubbly-bubbly pipes smelling of sweet apple to smoke. And nightcaps in the Baron Hotel. This is where Agatha Christie wrote part of her novel Murder on the Orient Express and where she used to shoot ducks from the terrace. It’s also where Laurence of Arabia stayed in the dark panelled rooms, drinking in the low-lit bar with its thick brocaded curtains and shuttered windows. Lawrence’s unpaid bar bill is still here, framed, together with a magnifier highlighting his words, ‘Another letter from this beautiful hotel.’
Aleppo is a tangle of history; prospering under a hefty list of empires and half the alphabet of the Middle East’s marauders, including Assyrians, Byzantines, Crusaders, Egyptians, French, Greeks, Mamelukes, Mongols, Ottomans, Persians and Romans. But, drinking thick coffee and looking out over the biblical sight of the city stretching far into the horizon, punctuated with domes and minarets rising like stream-line rockets, little seems to have changed. Take the four-hour desert train journey from Damascus – rather Forties, and clean and lovely and with flatbeds – and spend your time in Aleppo simply wandering about. If you’re quick about it, you may not bump into anyone you know.
A trip to Aleppo costs from £1,295 a person, including five nights at the Mansouriya, flights and transfers.
