The Royal Treatment

Over a decade after being restored to its full former glory, Taj Falaknuma Palace is still an ideal escape from a frenetic, chaotic present to the slower, decadent pace of centuries past.

- SAUMYAA VOHRA

THERE HAS ALWAYS been an air of excess about Hyderabad. Even its nickname, the City of Pearls, alludes to a royal past that is still in the city’s bones today. Built by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah of the Qutb Shahi dynasty in 1591, the city revels in decadence, with an unabashed fondness for the finer things in life. And while the advent of slick city bars and modern restaurants may have expanded the city’s definition of luxury over time, it is the institutions that pay homage to its unshakeable old-world glory that have become more and more pivotal to its sense of beauty and tradition.

The iconic Taj Falaknuma Palace falls high on that list. Falaknuma Palace, whose name means “mirroring the sky”, is a hotel with history, of course, but it doesn’t coast on that. The 1894-built former palace— commissioned by then reigning nawab, Viqar-ul-Umra, and built by British architect William Ward Marrett—sits over 2,000 feet above the city. As you’d imagine the palatial home of a man rumoured to be the wealthiest in the world might be. The city is rife with historic structures: Golconda Fort, once the capital of the medieval sultanate of the Qutb Shahi dynasty; Charminar; and Makkah Masjid, with its three arched façades carved from a single piece of granite. But Falaknuma Palace is the only one that will let you live within history’s walls instead of experiencing it piecemeal as you normally would, simply visiting on a tour to partake of a palace steeped in royal stories.