A 1592 Jesuit seminary built on the foundations of the palace of Sapa Inca Amaru Qhala, 122 rooms around two cloisters, the original baroque chapel, and the only hotel in Peru with oxygen-enriched rooms for altitude adaptation.
"The most quietly extraordinary hotel in South America, a 1592 seminary that still reads as a working monastery, on Inca foundations, two cloisters from the Plaza de Armas, with the only rooms in Cusco where you can actually sleep at 3,400 metres."
The Monasterio's foundation date is 1592: Bishop Antonio de la Raya commissioned the Seminary of San Antonio Abad on the site of the palace of Inca Amaru Qhala, two blocks from Cusco's Plaza de Armas, with the Jesuits installed as administrators. The seminary survived the 1650 earthquake (the cedar choir stalls in the chapel are from the post-quake reconstruction), the Jesuit expulsion of 1767, and three subsequent centuries as a teaching seminary until conversion to a hotel in 1965. The building reopened as the Hotel Monasterio in 1995 after Peruvian developer Lorenzo Sousa's comprehensive restoration; Orient-Express (now Belmond) assumed management in 1999 and renamed it Belmond Hotel Monasterio in 2014. The property is a Peruvian National Historic Monument, every modification is supervised by the Ministry of Culture, which has preserved the cloisters, the courtyard cedars (planted around 1620), and the gilt baroque chapel intact.
The 122 rooms are arranged around two cloisters and a third upper courtyard. Standard rooms (Monastery rooms) are former seminarian quarters, modest in size at around 25, 30 square metres but with timber-beamed ceilings, religious-art reproductions, restored stone-and-stucco walls, and the deep windows of the original 17th-century fabric. Superior, Junior Suite, and Suite categories step up through the upper floors with progressively better cloister views; the named suites (the Royal, the Plaza, the Garden) sit at the south end with views over the Plaza de las Nazarenas. Every room runs on oxygen-enriched air, the hotel installs supplemental oxygen at night to lift in-room saturation to roughly sea-level equivalent, which is the single most consequential operational decision the property makes and the reason it remains the only Cusco hotel where most guests do not feel altitude sickness on arrival.
Dining is anchored by Illariy, the formal Andean restaurant facing the main cloister, and Tupay, the more casual all-day venue. Illariy's tasting menu draws on the Andean Sacred Valley produce network, quinoa, cuy, alpaca, native potatoes, interpreted in a contemporary Peruvian register. The chapel hosts the hotel's most distinctive ritual: a nightly four-course tasting served on its own with a small string quartet under the 18th-century cedar ceiling. Afternoon tea in the main cloister, a working concierge desk with the Plaza de Armas guide-and-private-tour network, and a small wellness room for in-room treatments and acupuncture (a Cusco speciality) complete the amenity set. There is no pool, there is no Cusco hotel with a meaningful pool, but the chapel and the gardens compensate.
Service is the second decisive proposition. The staff-to-room ratio is reportedly the highest in Cusco; the concierge maintains the strongest restaurant-and-private-tour book in the city, the most reliable Inca Rail and PeruRail relationships for Machu Picchu logistics, and a dedicated medical resource for altitude management. By any honest measure, Belmond Hotel Monasterio is the most considered Andean hotel in Peru and the strongest historic-property luxury proposition in South America, a position it has held continuously since the Monasterio first opened as a hotel in 1965, sixty years ago this season.
For a Peru honeymoon the Monasterio is the answer for the Cusco half of the itinerary (paired with Sanctuary Lodge or a Sacred Valley hotel for the Machu Picchu leg). A Plaza Junior Suite or the Royal Suite gets the cloister views and the larger original-fabric envelope; the chapel dinner, a private four-course tasting in the 18th-century baroque chapel, is the signature romantic experience in Cusco that no other hotel can replicate.
Major-anniversary stays book a Suite (Garden, Plaza, or Royal), the chapel dinner, and the private Sacred Valley day with the property's preferred guide. The Monasterio handles the Inca Rail Belmond Hiram Bingham luxury train arrangement to Machu Picchu directly from the hotel concierge, the single best practical reason to base in Cusco rather than the Sacred Valley.
Cusco rewards solo travellers and the Monasterio is the strongest base for the version where you want quiet, beauty, and dependable altitude management. A Monastery room is sized for one (rare in the Belmond portfolio); the cloisters reward long unhurried walks; the chapel is one of the most beautiful semi-public interiors in the Americas; and the concierge runs the city's best private-guide programme for archaeological-site visits without the group-tour overhead.
Calle Palacio 136
Plazoleta Nazarenas, Cusco 08000
Peru
Plaza de Armas 2 blocks; Cusco Alejandro Velasco Astete Airport (CUZ) 15 minutes
122 rooms and suites
Monastery Rooms from USD 700/night
Superior & Junior Suite from USD 950
Plaza / Garden Suite from USD 1,800
Royal Suite from USD 4,500
Check-in: 2:00 PM
Check-out: 12:00 PM
Founded 1592 (seminary); hotel since 1965
National Historic Monument (Peru)
Oxygen-enriched rooms (3,400m altitude)
Illariy & Tupay restaurants
Private chapel dining
1620 cedar cloister courtyard
Belmond Hiram Bingham train concierge
WiFi throughout
From USD 700/night. The hotel runs near full through June, July, and August (Inca Trail high season); book three to four months ahead for these months, two to three months for shoulder. Royal Suite books four to six months ahead year-round.
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