The Shelbourne

The Shelbourne has stood on the north side of St Stephen's Green since 1824, its red-brick and stucco facade guarded by statues of Nubian princesses that generations of Dubliners use as a meeting point. History runs unusually deep here: the Irish Constitution was drafted in one of its rooms in 1922, and the hotel's guest book reads like a century of political and literary Ireland. Today it operates within Marriott's stable, but its character remains emphatically Dublin's own.

Bedrooms mix Georgian-inflected classicism with contemporary comfort, the best of them looking across the Green's treetops. The public rooms are the soul of the place—the Lord Mayor's Lounge for a famously proper afternoon tea, the little Horseshoe Bar for politicians and gossip, and No. 27 Bar overlooking the park. There is a small museum of hotel artefacts, a nice measure of how seriously the Shelbourne takes its own story.

The Saddle Room handles steaks and seafood in clubby surroundings, and a proper pool and spa sit below stairs, unusual for a historic Dublin address. Grafton Street, Trinity College and the Georgian squares are all within a short walk. It is not the most cutting-edge hotel in the city, and does not want to be; it is Dublin's living room, and staying here puts you at the centre of it.