A Slow Stay
Solo Palacio is a fifteenth-century manor house — a true Asturian palacio — and the small cluster of stone buildings around it, set high in the green folds of the Las Ubiñas natural park. It stands above the hamlet of Llanuces, in the rural concejo of Quirós, some forty minutes south of Oviedo and far beyond the reach of anything resembling a crowd.
The house was restored slowly and with ecological care, and furnished according to its owner's reading of wabi-sabi — the Japanese love of the imperfect, the weathered, the quietly aged. The result is a kind of luxurious plainness: lime-washed walls, bare stone, hand-thrown ceramics, an infinity pool that seems to spill into the valley. Nothing shouts. Everything has been considered.
The restoration kept the bones of the old manor intact — the chestnut beams, the rough stone walls, the timber granary (hórreo) raised on staddle stones in the Asturian way — and laid a wabi-sabi sensibility over the top. Interiors are pared back to lime plaster, polished concrete and natural linen, lit warmly and furnished with leather, oak and ceramic. Antique pieces sit beside contemporary craft; imperfection is treated as a virtue rather than a flaw. The palette is the palette of the landscape outside.
Accommodation is a handful of apartments, suites and a loft, each carved from the old buildings and each different in shape and mood. Some have open fires set into stone hearths; others have beamed attic ceilings, or backlit headboards glowing against lime-washed walls. Throughout there is white linen, hand-made ceramic, jute and oak, and a deliberate quiet — no televisions competing for attention, only the long views and the sound of the valley. Several rooms open directly onto the gardens and the pool terrace.
The heart of the place is outside. An infinity pool runs to the edge of the hillside, its surface meeting the line of the mountains beyond; around it, wild grasses, dry-stone walls and sun loungers angled at the view. The estate works closely with local producers as part of a wider commitment to the land and the rural economy of Quirós, and the cooking follows the seasons of the valley. Mornings here are for slow breakfasts and walking; evenings for the light going down over Las Ubiñas.
This is some of the wildest country in Spain. The Las Ubiñas–La Mesa natural park rises immediately around the house — limestone peaks, beech forest, brown bears in the high ground — and the Cantabrian range runs east toward the Picos de Europa. Quirós and its neighbouring valleys are walking country, dotted with stone hamlets and Romanesque churches. Oviedo, the elegant Asturian capital, is forty minutes north; the green Atlantic coast, with its cider houses and empty beaches, around an hour and a half.
Indicative rates — vary by season and availability. Breakfast typically included. Confirm directly with the hotel for current pricing.
Reserve at Solo Palacio
