Luxury Hotels Atlas / Places / Italy / Rome / Singer Palace Hotel Roma
Singer Palace Hotel Roma
Rome, Italy · Independent · High Luxury
Sir Douglas Alexander, president of the Singer Corporation, wanted an Italian headquarters worth photographing, so in 1930 he commissioned Mario Loreti, and Domus published the result two years later for its staircase alone: self-supporting marble steps, a chrome-aluminium balustrade, a walnut handrail and details in galalith, a plastic made from milk. The building later passed to a bank, and the Art Deco survived every owner. The Visocchi family opened it as a thirty-room hotel in 2018, and that staircase is still the first thing you meet.
- 30 rooms
- Opened 2018
- Neighborhood: Pigna / Via del Corso
- Architect: Mario Loreti
- Interiors: Elisa Ferrari
About Singer Palace Hotel Roma
- Domus gave space in its November 1932 issue to Loreti's stair, describing cantilevered steps, walls of Cipollino d'Arni marble and a chrome-aluminium insert that repeats the pattern of the balustrade.
- The round lifts are still panelled in dark wood, the vestibule still carries its Bakelite fittings and stained glass, and the whole thing went up as a sewing machine showroom and office.
- A three-dimensional metal sculpture in the lobby nods to Amerigo Tot, the Hungarian artist who kept a studio a few doors from the Singer building in the 1950s.
- Le Terrazze and Jim's Bar share the fifth floor, the bar pouring 1920s cocktails over the rooftops between Via del Corso and Piazza Venezia.
- Twenty rooms and ten suites, and the two Singer Suites connect into a single apartment that sleeps six.
History
The building at Via Alessandro Specchi 10, a lane off Via del Corso just short of Piazza Venezia, was raised in 1930 and 1931 for Sir Douglas Alexander, 1st Baronet, the president of the Singer Corporation, who wanted a headquarters and showroom for Compagnia Italiana Singer in the centre of Rome. He gave the job to the architect Mario Loreti, and the result was published in Domus in November 1932, specifically for its staircase: self-supporting cantilevered steps in Arabescato Corchia marble, walls of Cipollino d'Arni, a balustrade of chrome aluminium with walnut friezes and inserts of galalith, an early plastic made from milk protein. The lobby was panelled in dark walnut with marble inlay.
Singer eventually sold the palazzo to a bank and it changed hands repeatedly over the following decades, but the Art Deco fabric came through almost untouched: the stair, the entrance and vestibule, the round wood-panelled lifts, the boiserie, the Bakelite fittings and the stained glass all survive. In 2018 the Visocchi family completed a renovation and opened the Singer Palace Hotel Roma, with interiors by Elisa Ferrari keeping the period bones and adding velvet, silk wall coverings and works by Francesca Maffucci and Maria Angeles Vila Tortosa. A metal sculpture in the lobby refers to Amerigo Tot, the Hungarian sculptor who worked from a studio nearby in the 1950s. The fifth floor holds the Le Terrazze dining room and Jim's Bar, both open to the roofline of the historic centre.
The setting
Via Alessandro Specchi is a short lane running off Via del Corso a block from Piazza Venezia, which puts the house inside the tight grid of Rione Pigna: Palazzo Doria Pamphilj and its picture gallery are on the same block, the Pantheon is about six minutes on foot, and the Trevi Fountain a similar walk in the other direction. Corner rooms look out over Via del Corso, the straight shopping spine that runs from Piazza Venezia to Piazza del Popolo, while rooms on the courtyard side stay quiet. The Colosseum, the Roman Forum and the Capitoline are all within a fifteen-minute walk south.
Restaurants and bars
- Le Terrazze, Singer Palace Hotel Roma — Restaurant · Roman
Awards
- MICHELIN One Key (2026)
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