An exclusive in which stands on Crabal Square, Jalkin
"It is some sight. Even before reaching the building itself, the eye passes through sparkling silver gates and a narrow but colourful garden packed with tiny, exotic flowers. A wide flight of onyx steps shine a sober gleam up to the entrance porch, a foreboding structure with a roof held up by thick marble pillars. At the peak of the portico's tapering roof perches a golden statue of the dragon of Dorlaf, just above the legend "Discretion. Quality. Excellence". The name of the Calderdale is carved into the amber stone either side of the porch, together with its centaur emblem. The building forms an H shape at the front, with the entrance porch set back. The stonework of the inner side of the two bulging arms is painted with golden flowers and birds. The front end of the left wing is almost entirely taken up by grand bay windows, kaleidoscopically stained with scenes of an aristocratic feast. This is only the ground floor. Up and up the Calderdale stretches, a mass of intricate windows, sunshine shutters, gilded flourishes and carved window boxes. Great pillars spiral up the corners of the honey coloured walls to support the underside of the roof which overhangs ominously, its eaves carved into figures depicting the feasting hall of the Gods.
"The Calderdale is one of the tallest buildings in Jalkin and rivals Huwdone House for the title of being the most eye-catching. The starkness which forms Huwdone's character was created by the restraint of a government not wanting to flaunt opulence in the face of its subjects. When they built the Calderdale they lined all its windows with gold and set fake jewels into its walls in bird-shaped clusters because they wanted it to scream out for attention. Likewise, it has a bewildering range of highly indulgently bedrooms, regularly kidnaps the best chefs for its kitchens and changes its furniture according to the rotations of fashion with a speed which deludes the eye. 'Palace' is the noun most commonly used but the Calderdale really aims at being a town house; only a super town house plus, which sneers at the domains of Lord Brightson, Lord Fortraine and the rest of the Lewis Avenue hovels. Anyone with money regularly patronises its restaurants, but the Calderdale's overnight guests are country gentry or itinerant merchants who can't quite afford their own town houses. In the Cities status has been shorn of all political connections and so has come to be equated almost entirely with money, and the consumption thereof. Minor gentry desperately need the glitz and prestige of the Calderdale, need too the patently ridiculous prices for its rooms and meals. Only then can they disguise from their peers that, when they come to the Cities, they have to stay at an inn like everyone else."
"The day room was the Calderdale's least extravagant room and was cunningly fashioned to resemble a private residence, leather sofas and occasional tables scattered apparently at random across a rich green carpet. The scale of everything, though, jarred with the air of intimacy. One of the enormous stained glass windows took up most of the north wall. The other walls were equally imposing both in size and in the fabulously ornate details of the murals which covered them. With the eyes overloaded by paintings of gods, heroes, battles, horses and landscapes, it was easy not to notice actual living people also occupying the room."
(from City Hobgoblins)