"From the outside the red rusticated facade and a restored vintage car hint at Paragon 700’s theatrical interior, where founders Pascale Lauber and Ulrike Bauschke have unleashed a wildly imaginative design vision: Baroque-meets-Tim Burton baroque theatrics, macabre monkey statues and reinterpreted Renaissance works sit alongside artist-designed sofas and more restrained, fresco-ceilinged guest rooms. The underground spa—built into caves and accessed by a glass elevator—offers hydromassage, a Turkish bath, a Himalayan salt wall and a natural whirlpool, while the hotel’s sustainability commitments (micro‑CHP, zero plastics, local materials) and its prime Ostuni location make it a perfect base to return to for a dip, an offbeat cocktail and dinner at Restaurant 700." - Liam Hess