How Chic
came to be.

Chapter I · The Vision

Vlorë deserved
something better.

Vlorë has long been one of the most beautiful cities on the Adriatic — and one of the most underestimated. The beach is 500 metres from the old town. The bay curves south into the beginning of the Albanian Riviera. The light, particularly in the late afternoon, is the kind photographers travel across continents to find. And yet, for years, the hotels failed to match the setting.

The decision to build The Grand Hotel came from a simple frustration: the city deserved better. Not just bigger. Not just newer. Better — in the precise, uncompromising sense of the word. Better service. Better design. Better food. A better reason to stay.

From the outset, the concept was clear: a 4-star boutique hotel that felt, in every meaningful way, like considerably more. The kind of hotel where guests arrive planning two nights and extend to five. Where the staff know your name by morning and your coffee preference by afternoon. Where the breakfast table is worth waking up for.

Chapter II · The Build

Every room
considered. Every
detail intentional.

Construction was not hurried. The design process involved considerable argument about what a boutique hotel should feel like in this specific location — not an imported European formula dropped onto Albanian soil, but something rooted in the climate, the light, and the pace of Vlorë life. Dark finishes that don't fight the sun. Natural materials. Rooms that breathe.

Each room type was designed with a specific guest in mind. The Junior Room for the solo traveller or couple who wants simplicity done well. The Premium and Deluxe Triples for families and groups who need space without sacrificing quality. The Book a Room — Sea View — for those who came to truly arrive, to open a window and feel the Adriatic was put there for them personally.

Every detail of The Grand Hotel was considered. Clean rooms, great service, and a genuine welcome — that was the standard from day one.

Chapter III · The Opening

The guests who
found us — and
told everyone else.

Chic opened in 2024. The first guests found the hotel the way the best guests always do — through a recommendation, a photograph, a friend who had been to Vlorë and couldn't stop talking about it. Word spread quietly and quickly. By the end of the first season, the reviews were extraordinary: five stars, without exception, from guests across France, Italy, Germany, Greece, the UK, and the United States.

What the reviews kept returning to was not the amenities — though those received consistent praise — but the feeling. The sense that the hotel genuinely cared. That something about the place was real, not performed. Albanian hospitality is not a policy you can train into a team. It is something they bring with them. The Chic team brought it in abundance.

The restaurant — with its outdoor terrace and seasonal menu — became a destination in its own right. Guests who were not staying at the hotel began asking to dine there. The bar, as evenings stretched into the golden hour over Vlorë Bay, became a place people didn't want to leave.

Looking Forward

Still early.
Still learning.
Still improving.

The Grand Hotel is still growing. Every season brings something new — a piece of feedback that changes how we think, a guest interaction that sets a new standard, a local ingredient or producer we hadn't worked with before. We are not a finished product. We are an ongoing commitment to a city and a coast we believe in.

Vlorë is on the cusp of something. The Albanian Riviera is being discovered — slowly, carefully, by the right kind of travellers. We intend to be part of that story: a hotel that showed what was possible here, that didn't wait for the moment to be obvious before committing to it.

The view from the Book a Room at dawn — the sea light coming in, the bay below, Vlorë waking up — is, we think, one of the finest things Albania has to offer. We built a hotel around it. We hope you'll come and see for yourself.