This intoxicatingly gorgeous hotel is testament to what happens when you give a design team carte blanche over the interiors. In this case the designers were Autoban – Istanbul’s avant-garde architect firm – and boy did the company spend some money. The hotel is made up of 17 sumptuous suites – there are no puny ‘deluxe doubles’ in this establishment. The minimum suite size is a whopping 60-square-metres, although many are much larger with Bosphorus views to boot: little wonder Witt won Wallpaper* magazine’s best new hotel award in 2009. The freestanding kitchenettes in the middle of each suite are an immediate showstopper, made of Turkish marble and holding just enough equipment to blend a killer piña colada. Witt also benefits from a 1:1 staff-to-client ratio, a bar that serves a complimentary home-cooked breakfast, and a library stocked with design tomes and the sort of intelligent novels that you are supposed to read but never get around to. Prices are nevertheless keen compared with the city’s other upscale offerings.