The world’s best concierge
Mark Palmer
We’ve just returned from a short break in Taormina, Sicily, and the person who made our trip so memorable was a tall, wiry man called Steven Ceschia. He’s not a tour operator or a personal friend or even a friend of a friend, but during the course of our stay at the San Domenico Palace Hotel it was Steven who made the difference between what would have been an enjoyable few days on the island’s northeast coast and what turned out to be an exceptional, neverto-be-forgotten experience in one of Italy’s grandest monastery hotels.
Steven is head concierge of the San Domenico Palace. And he’s the best, most efficient, knowledgeable and charming concierge I have ever come across. If I were running a hotel anywhere in the world I would hire him on the spot — for big money. Actually, if I had big money myself I would make Steven my personal Man Friday. Everything sorted. Some of us have long understood the value of a good concierge, and now it seems that all manner of ‘concierge services’ are available to those willing to pay for them. Entire businesses — such as Ben Elliot’s Quintessentially (‘accessing the inaccessible’) — are launched to do what people like Steven do. Apparently, any new block of pricey apartments in London now must offer tenants a concierge service if they want to sell well. Sign up with White Glove Lifestyle Concierge, for example, and it will cost you some £2,400 a year.
Which is all very well, but Steven comes for free when you’re billeted in his hotel, save for a generous tip at the end of your stay. And if you make a point of befriending a concierge there’s no reason why you can’t use his services at any other time. I got to know Simon Thomas when he was a relatively junior member of the concierge team at the Royal Garden Hotel near Kensington Palace Gardens and still call him from time to time to seek his help. He was 29 when we met, and he had just been appointed the youngest vice-president of the Society of the Gold Keys (‘Clefs D’Or’) for Great Britain and the Commonwealth, a position of distinction in this extraordinary brotherhood to which members are elected once they have accumulated five years’ experience working in a ‘hotel of good standing’. ‘The words I like to say best in this job are “leave it with me” and “yes, it’s all taken care of”,’ says Thomas, who is now head concierge at Brown’s in Albemarle Street. ‘I am confident of doing whatever I am asked. The only impediment is cost. Things like getting hold of tickets to the Cup Final or Wimbledon are easy as long as the client is willing to pay.’ Rather harder was a request from a music promoter who was looking for a birthday present for Eric Clapton and wanted to give him a golden pheasant. Thomas rang London Zoo, which passed on the number of a breeder in Scotland, and within hours the pheasant was strutting around Clapton’s country estate. Then there was the Kuwaiti businessman who asked Thomas to get hold of the best possible industrial machinery for slicing bread, which he wanted to take back to his factory in the Middle East.
It’s like any other relationship. The more you put in — by which I mean the more information you give your concierge — the more you will get back. On arrival at the San Domenico, I explained to Steven exactly why we were there and what we were hoping to do. I told him we had three nights and that one of those should include dinner in the hotel. We wanted to see Mount Etna, weather permitting, and we were interested in finding a shop selling marble from, ideally, Verona. He got it exactly right on all fronts. The first night — when we were weary — he booked us into a nearby restaurant called Da Lorenzo, which wasn’t at all grand but served spectacularly fresh food that arrived promptly. And on our last night — after we had bought a piece of Verona marble — he directed us to Maffei’s, just off the town’s main street, which specialises in seafood. It was sensational.
When it came to Mount Etna he could not be faulted either. He told us exactly when to leave the hotel, warning that clouds would roll in by 1 p.m., and he recommended that we should not take the gondola up to the highest point. We obeyed instructions on the timing but took the gondola anyway and he was right again. It was expensive and underwhelming.
A good concierge understands discretion. I remember one called Nic Lander at the Millennium Hotel, Mayfair, telling me about a middle-aged man who checked in with his wife in a room on the sixth floor and at the same time arranged for his mistress to stay on the first floor. Lander’s task was to make sure the two women never met. My new friend, Steven, has had his triumphs. One that springs to his mind came when working at a hotel in Paris the day a Middle Eastern prince walked in and asked if the entire contents of a gaming shop, stocked with electronic goods, pinball machines and one-armed bandits, could be brought to his suite for the duration of his stay. No problem.
‘A lot of guests don’t really use our services enough,’ he told me shortly before our departure, just as I was thinking that I might have used his services to excess. ‘It’s crazy really, because we have a lot of local knowledge and it’s one of the things you are paying for in a good hotel. Now, can I give you directions back to the airport?’
Citalia (0870 9097554; www.citalia.com) offers seven nights at the San Domenico Palace, Sicily, in a room with a sea view from £1,799 per person. Price is based on two sharing on a half-board basis and includes BA flights from Gatwick.
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