Nobis Hotel Palma
La Calatrava / Old City, Mallorca · flagship
THE VIBE
A thousand years of sandstone, Gothic frescoes and a Norwegian design studio that set steel against the medieval.
THE BACKSTORY
Can Oliver is an 11th-century Islamic palace building at Carrer de les Caputxines 9, rebuilt in Gothic style in the 15th century and in Baroque style in the 17th. Previous conversion projects fell apart on municipal heritage grounds. Nobis Hospitality Group commissioned Swedish practice Wingårdhs (project-led by Helena Toresson) alongside Spanish firms Jordi Herrero Arquitectos and Eduardo García Acuña to carry out the transformation. The guiding principle was reversibility: new interventions in blackened steel are visually distinct from the original masonry and can be removed without damaging the historic fabric.
WHY NOW
Nobis Hotel Palma opened in December 2023 in the former Islamic palace Can Oliver — one of La Calatrava's most protected properties, now accessible to guests for the first time in a long while. Spacious suites with preserved 12th-century vaulted ceilings are already booking out months ahead of the 2026 summer season.
THE ROOM
Of the hotel's 37 rooms, 11 are suites; the Can Oliver Suite accommodates up to four guests and retains the building's exposed palm sandstone and Gothic vaulting. Upper-floor suites have an angled view towards the bell tower of La Seu cathedral.
WELLNESS
The hotel's spa occupies a medieval underground tunnel — originally an escape route — and houses a heated indoor pool, a dry sauna and an infrared sauna. A heated saltwater pool in the courtyard completes the offering; capacity is stated at two guests at a time.
THE TABLE
Sharing plates from the seasonal menu — locally caught fish and vegetables from the Serra de Tramuntana — NOI (in the hotel, Carrer de la Sagristia de Sant Jaume 5). The hotel's own restaurant under Xema Álvarez operates an explicit zero-kilometre sourcing ethos and is culinarily the most well-positioned dining experience in the building.
THE SERVICE
NOI — the hotel's restaurant under head chef Xema Álvarez, Mallorcan by birth — serves European sharing plates built around locally sourced produce from the island and the Serra de Tramuntana. Breakfast buffet (35 euros for external guests), weekday lunch menus and à la carte evening service.
THE NEIGHBORHOOD
La Calatrava is the quarter running between La Seu and the sea, once Palma's aristocratic neighbourhood, today the densest concentration of protected medieval properties in the city. The hotel sits within a traffic-restricted zone (ACIRE) on Carrer de les Caputxines, one of the quarter's narrowest streets. The restaurant scenes of Santa Catalina and the Born quarter are reachable on foot in ten minutes.
HONEST CAVEAT
La Calatrava is one of Palma's quietest neighbourhoods in the evenings — ideal for those who want historic density, not for anyone who prioritises direct access to the city's most animated restaurant cluster. Breakfast is not included in the room rate.
THE VERDICT
Nobis Palma is not a hotel that happens to occupy a historic building — the building is the point. Wingårdhs' reversible steel intervention against 900 years of sandstone, Gothic and Baroque makes a rare architectural case for a hotel stay. Book before summer-season occupancy turns securing a room into a project.
THE FULL PICTURE
La Calatrava is Palma's least-circulated neighbourhood among visitors. This is partly geography — the quarter runs along the city's eastern ramparts, beneath the Cathedral, through a network of lanes that lead nowhere in particular — and partly because the area has had almost no hotel supply at the imperial tier. Nobis Hotel Palma addresses that. Nobis Hospitality Group — the Swedish operator that began with Nobis Hotel Stockholm in 2010, expanded through Gothenburg and Helsingborg, and now operates in Palma — chose La Calatrava for its Mallorcan flagship, and the choice is deliberate.
This is a 37-room hotel in a converted historic building, and the interior's logic follows the same Nobis house standard established in Stockholm: quality materials, proportions that respect the original rooms, lighting that performs rather than impresses. Mallorcan sandstone is visible in the walls. Ceiling heights are generous. Room dimensions are not the constrained footprints of a typical boutique conversion — there is space to move.
The indoor pool is genuinely unusual. In Palma's historic core, a pool at all is uncommon; an indoor pool usable year-round without compromising the building's historic character is notable. It sits within the hotel's spa volume, constructed in natural stone with indirect lighting — not a hotel pool in the conventional sense but a considered wellness space.
The rooftop garden terrace is the property's social centre of gravity. The view over Palma's old-city roofscape — the Cathedral tower, the silhouette of Bellver Castle at the horizon, the Arabic Baths neighbourhood's roofline — is the kind of urban panorama that Palma rarely makes available in hotel form. The terrace is accessible to all guests and functions as a natural gathering point at dusk.
NOI Palma restaurant carries the Nobis restaurant brand's name but works with Mallorcan ingredients and the local Mediterranean rhythm. The menu is seasonally calibrated; the kitchen sources from the island rather than from a centralised supply chain. It is cooking with genuine intention and without unnecessary complexity.
La Calatrava offers a quiet that neither El Born nor Santa Catalina can match. The Arab Baths — one of Europe's best-preserved Moorish hamams, dating from the 10th century — are half a block away. The neighbourhood is residential and authentic in the way that a central urban district of a mid-sized European city can be. Guests who want immediate access to Palma's liveliest restaurant and bar scene along El Born and Passeig des Born should plan for a ten-minute walk. For those who value a neighbourhood with integrity — and a hotel backed by Nobis Group's well-demonstrated operational standard — the calibration is excellent.
FACTS
- Neighbourhood: La Calatrava / Old City
- Stars: 5
- From 650 EUR per night
- Tripadvisor: 4.3/5 (69)
- 39.5687, 2.6545
FAQ
When is the best time to visit?
Nobis Hotel Palma opened in December 2023 in the former Islamic palace Can Oliver — one of La Calatrava's most protected properties, now accessible to guests for the first time in a long while. Spacious suites with preserved 12th-century vaulted ceilings are already booking out months ahead of the 2026 summer season.
Anything I should know before booking?
La Calatrava is one of Palma's quietest neighbourhoods in the evenings — ideal for those who want historic density, not for anyone who prioritises direct access to the city's most animated restaurant cluster. Breakfast is not included in the room rate.
What is the neighbourhood like around Nobis Hotel Palma?
La Calatrava is the quarter running between La Seu and the sea, once Palma's aristocratic neighbourhood, today the densest concentration of protected medieval properties in the city. The hotel sits within a traffic-restricted zone (ACIRE) on Carrer de les Caputxines, one of the quarter's narrowest streets. The restaurant scenes of Santa Catalina and the Born quarter are reachable on foot in ten minutes.
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