After much deliberation I’ve decided that I am, after all, going to open this review with: Gran Melia Colon - popular with bullfighters.I realise you are unlikely to have clients who fight bulls but if one ever pops in you’ll be uniquely prepared to offer them a suitable hotel in Seville.And actually it would work quite nicely for people who don’t wear a cape and silly hat too.This Leading Hotel of the World, fresh from a serious makeover, is as much a part of the city’s history as the controversial Spanish sport and its famous local arena Real Maestranza around the corner.

It opened more than 80 years ago in what is now called the old quarter (old-ish quarter back then) and while the décor is certainly more snazzy than it would have been in the 1920s one still feels Andalusian blood pulsing through the walls.As one would expect in this part of the world this passion is best expressed on the plate. If you think tapas is simply lots of lovely little treats on lots of lovely little sharing plates then Burladero will blow your tiny little patatas bravas mind.This treat of a restaurant is, I hate to say it, a ‘reinterpretation of tapas’. But don’t hold that against it. If you’ve ever wanted to eat Spain this is your chance.

Food, tick, spa, tick, decent bedrooms, tick. And to upgrade on everything Melia offers Red Level service which is the hotel equivalent of supersizing your meal. But without risking a coronary episode.The building that houses all this is rather grandly listed as a monument, the plus side of which is that however excited the designer got he couldn’t turn it into an ode to Laurence Llewellyn Bowen.So the façade, the central dome that turns the lobby into a piece of art and the staircases are the same as those which greeted guests ocho decades ago.

Having said all that my favourite place was actually the Jacuzzi on the roof which I’m pretty sure wasn’t there when Alfonso XIII was on the throne.If there’s a finer spot to survey Spain’s fourth largest city I’ll eat my new silly bullfighter hat.HOW MUCH: From £340 per night.gran-melia.com