Asilah — Morocco's Whitewashed Art Town

Forty minutes south of Tangier, Asilah is what happens when a Portuguese fortress town spends five centuries by the Atlantic and then, in 1978, invites the world's muralists to paint it. The result: blinding white walls, sea-blue trim, and fresh street art repainted every summer during the arts festival. We've been guiding travellers here for years — ramparts walks, gallery lanes, Raissouni Palace, and seafood lunch metres from the boats that caught it. It's the calmest, most photogenic day on the northern coast — and almost no one outside Morocco knows it.