Fez Ville Nouvelle — French colonial boulevard and Art Deco café scene at evening

Fez

Ville Nouvelle

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Top pick

The French colonial grid — restaurants, patisseries, and the most liveable base outside the medina walls.

The Ville Nouvelle was built by the French protectorate administration from 1912 onward: a grid of wide boulevards (Avenue Hassan II, Boulevard Mohammed V) with Art Deco public buildings, French-style cafés, modern hotels, and the commercial infrastructure that the medina doesn't provide. The Mohammed V Boulevard patisseries serve the best French pastries in Morocco outside Casablanca (Maison Bennis produces mille-feuille and éclair alongside Moroccan cornes de gazelle). The Ville Nouvelle is where Fez's professional class lives and works, and the evening café culture on the boulevard is one of the most pleasant experiences the city offers.

Scores

9/10

Walkability

7/10

Transit

6/10

Price

7/10

Local feel

6/10

Nightlife

8/10

Family-friendly

6/10

Centrality

What you gain

  • ↑The restaurant scene in the Ville Nouvelle is Fez's best for non-Moroccan food: Restaurant Zagora (Moroccan-French fusion), Dar Roumana in the medina fringe, and the boulevard patisseries offer cooking that is more consistently reliable than the tourist-facing restaurants inside Bab Bou Jeloud. For those spending a week in Fez, the Ville Nouvelle restaurants provide essential variety.
  • ↑Accommodation value in the Ville Nouvelle is exceptional: modern Moroccan hotels (Palais Faraj, Hotel Mounia) offer swimming pools, air conditioning, and reliable WiFi for prices that make comparable medina riads look expensive. For summer visits when medina heat is exhausting, a Ville Nouvelle hotel with a pool is a legitimate base..
  • ↑The evening café culture on Avenue Hassan II and the surrounding streets is where Fez's middle class socialises: patisseries open until midnight, outdoor seating with mint tea and almond pastry, and a relaxed urban atmosphere that the medina (which winds down at dusk) doesn't provide.

What you sacrifice

  • ↓The Ville Nouvelle offers none of the historic character that brings visitors to Fez: the French colonial buildings are pleasant but not extraordinary, and staying here without daily medina trips means missing the entire point of the city.
  • ↓The distance from the old medina (15–20 minutes by taxi from the far end of the Ville Nouvelle) adds friction to daily medina access, particularly in summer heat when the return journey at midday is uncomfortable.

Best for

those who want modern hotel comforts alongside medina day tripssummer visitors who need air conditioning and pool accesslong-stay visitors who want restaurant variety

Avoid if

those who want full medina immersionarchitecture and historic city enthusiastsvisitors on short trips who should maximise medina time

Other Fez neighbourhoods

Fez el-Bali (Old Medina)

The world's largest living medieval city — 9,400 streets, 14th-century madrasas, and the Chouara tannery.

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Fez el-Jdid & Mellah

The Jewish quarter and Royal Palace gates — a second historic city within the city, almost unvisited.

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Batha & Rcif

The southern medina gateway — the Batha Museum palace and the most local section of Fez el-Bali.

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Know where to stay — now find when to go.

Best time to visit Fez →