Four Seasons Hotel Casa Medina hotel - Bogotá, Colombia

When the Colombian architect Santiago Medina Mejia built Casa Medina in 1946 in Bogotá, he filled the apartment block with stone columns, floorboards, and hand-carved wooden doors salvaged from demolished convents.

Happily, these gracious period details alongside Mejia’s original wrought iron finishes have survived two rounds of renovations, the first in 1988 when Casa Medina – by now, a beloved landmark in downtown Bogotá – was converted into a hotel, the second, this year, by architect Milena Vargas as one of two Four Seasons properties in the city

With just 62 rooms, the hotel’s masculine furnishings are courtesy of interior designer Lauren Rottet who has complemented the original slanted beamed ceilings, sweeping lobby staircase, fireplaces, and convent doors with Chesterfield lounges, geometric patterned rugs, and mirror-clad travellers’ trunks.

The sunny courtyard is now topped with glass and converted into the all-day Spanish diner Castanyoles, though it would be churlish to bypass the spectacular gastronomic offerings at the hotel’s doorstep in Zona G.