Lake Pichola Hotel

This is the real thing: an opulent 18th-century haveli built as the city residence of the Jagirdars of Thikana Piplia — descendants of Maharaj Shakti Singh, younger brother of Maharana Pratap. In 1981 Thakur Chandra Bhanu Singh, fresh from hotel-management training in Salzburg, set about restoring the Mardana wing of his family home, and in 1985 it opened its doors as Lake Pichola Hotel, named for the water it sits on.

The location is the trump card. You're on Brahmapuri island on the western bank of Lake Pichola — out of the old town's hustle, yet five minutes' walk from the monuments and cafes — and the view goes the right way: across the water to the City Palace, Jag Mandir and the bathing embankments. Every room has a balcony; the four suites each have two, with a traditional wooden swing and a day mattress for doing nothing at all.

The atmospherics run from dazzling chandeliers in the durbar-hall lobby to specially commissioned Thikri (mirror-work) pieces by local artists, landscaped gardens, and a rooftop pool that the hotel itself describes as shimmering under moonlit nights. Fair warning from us: it's a heritage restoration, not a slick modern build — that's exactly the appeal.

Come evening you graze well without leaving the property: rooftop Upre for dinner facing the lit-up City Palace, Maharana in the durbar-hall lobby for breakfast and lunch, the Gallery Cafe on an overhanging verandah for Italian coffee, and Asha Bar, glittering with Thikri work and named after a famous local liquor.