A watermelon, a vendor who had no interest in my Moroccan darija, and forty-five seconds that told me more about where I was than anything else I did that day. On why the local market is the most honest room in any city, and the first place I go. The hotel concierge will send you somewhere safe. The market will send you somewhere true.

We proudly introduce Liberty Barrons, our new Senior Luxury Travel Curator. She has solo backpacked from Colombia to Antarctica, sent clients to frozen lakes in Swedish Lapland, and has very considered opinions about the hotel you found on Instagram.

Ever since I started working in travel, Ethiopia settled itself in the back of my mind as the ultimate destination. Growing up on the opposite side of Africa, I was intrigued by this seemingly different and mysterious country that shared my continent.

I never thought I’d return to Morocco as a traveler - especially having lived here for 20 years. Isn’t travel supposed to offer perpetual excitement of being in an unfamiliar place? Shouldn’t it have an element of the unknown by default? That’s what I thought too, until recently. Born in Marrakech in the late 80s and raised in Fez and Rabat throughout the 90s, I lived in a relatively untouched Morocco, before it gained worldwide fame as a boho-chic tourist hotspot.