Price: Rooms from about £140 per night
This dramatically turreted Gothic Revival pile, with its double-spiral staircases, soaring traced windows and five-metre-high ceilings, used to be the central post office in Ghent. The interiors have been adapted to their new purpose with low-key northern European flair. In keeping with the epistolary theme, there are bundles of old letters, inkpots and paperweights. Though the visual cues are different, the overall vibe – at once sumptuous and modest, impeccable and unpretentious – will be familiar to anyone who has visited other Zannier hotels, such as its gorgeous flagship chalet in Megève.
Bedrooms are categorised according to size: from Stamps and Envelopes to Letters all the way up to the wildly romantic Tower Suite. Though the proportions vary greatly, the style is consistent throughout, with lots of deep arboreal greens, woody, brassy accents and gleaming marble bathrooms. Most rooms have fine views of the historic city centre and its churches, castles, riverside mansions, atmospheric lanes and picturesque genever joints.
Yet Ghent feels less self-consciously museum-like than Bruges, more like a place where ordinary life goes on, thanks to its large, friendly student population. Go – post-haste – and marvel at Van Eyck’s altarpiece in St Bavo’s cathedral. Stuff your face with waffles in the market square. Then repair to the hotel’s superb bar, The Cobbler, for a digestif before retiring to your fairy-tale digs. Definitely somewhere to write home about. Steve King