Hotel de la Ville Launches Cultural Experience Above the Spanish Steps

Rome has always been a city of layers – mythology pressed beneath cobblestone, antiquity breathing through every portico. This spring, Hotel de la Ville, a Rocco Forte Hotel perched above the Spanish Steps, gives that layering a deliberate form with the launch of Venus in Rome – an immersive experience that traces the goddess through the city’s cultural landmarks, from ancient temples to contemporary haute couture.

The journey begins at the Roman Forum, where the Temple of Venus Genetrix stands as an emblem of origin and feminine strength. From there, guests move to the Capitoline Museums – home to the celebrated Capitoline Venus – where exclusive after-hours private visits offer an intimate encounter with one of antiquity’s most revered representations of beauty. The itinerary continues to the National Roman Museum at Palazzo Altemps, housing the sensuous Venus Callipyge, and on to Villa Borghese, where the spirit of Ovid’s poetic narratives comes vividly to life among the park’s mythic landscapes.

The experience reaches its contemporary crescendo at the Fondazione Valentino Garavani e Giancarlo Giammetti, where Joana Vasconcelos’ exhibition Venus enters into dialogue with the refined world of Valentino haute couture – ancient symbolism refracted through the lens of living art.

Back at the hotel, the celebration extends inward. Suite guests are welcomed with a bespoke cocktail inspired by the colours and fragrances of a Roman spring, before stepping into the Irene Forte Spa for a curated Venus Spa Experience rooted in ancient Roman beauty rituals. The centrepiece treatment combines exclusive manual techniques with Irene Forte Skincare – a line formulated with high-performance Mediterranean botanicals – before culminating in a session of cryotherapy, a technique that stimulates microcirculation, encourages drainage, and delivers an immediate revitalising effect on the skin. Seasonal transition, met with cold precision.

Conceived with Mother’s Day in mind – May being a month long associated with Venus herself – the experience carries an openness well beyond the occasion. It speaks equally to those seeking a solo ritual of renewal, a mother–daughter escape, or a gathering of friends in pursuit of shared beauty and meaning.

Venus in Rome is, at its core, a meditation on continuity – the idea that beauty, connection, and the feminine have always been woven into the fabric of this city, and that certain hotels know exactly how to illuminate what was already there.