Palazzo Margherita

Palazzo Margherita was once a crumbling 19th-century relic, but while re-discovering his roots in the 15th-century hilltop town of Bernalda (in Matera), The Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola pledged to restore the decaying building to its former glory. The result is more family home than hotel, with unobtrusive yet intuitive service, extravagant suites designed by the Coppola clan and rustic home-made cooking. It’s a rarefied Baroque bolthole where you’re welcomed like an honorary member of the film-making dynasty – surely the kind of offer no-one could refuse.